Getting to be a ripe old age is a privilege, Pope Francis told older priests. If facing an illness, that too, becomes a privilege in that one resembles Jesus, “who suffers, and one carries the cross, just like him,” he said in a written letter. “Pray for me as I am a little old and a little sick, but not a lot!” he added. The letter was read aloud to priests from the northern Italian region of Lombardy taking part in a “Day of Fraternity” Sept. 16 with their bishops in the town of Caravaggio.

Consistory to reflect on Church’s mission to communicate God’s love
In a letter to the Cardinals ahead of a late-June Consistory, Pope Leo XIV calls for a deeper reflection on the themes of “Evangelii gaudium,”


