San Francisco Frontiers - Ailing pope 'critical but stable', Vatican says

Catholics across the globe have been praying for the 88-year-old amid hope he may be turning a corner on what doctors warn could be a long path to recovery.

"The Holy Father's clinical condition remains critical but stable," the Vatican said the evening of Francis's 12th day in the papal suite of Rome's Gemelli hospital.

"There have been no acute respiratory episodes and hemodynamic parameters continue to be stable," it said in a statement, referring to parameters such as heart rate and blood pressure.

Francis, admitted on February 14 with breathing difficulties, suffered asthmatic respiratory attacks at the weekend that required high levels of oxygen and blood transfusions to combat anaemia.

On Tuesday, "he underwent a scheduled follow-up CT scan in the evening for radiological monitoring of bilateral pneumonia", the Vatican said.

"The prognosis remains reserved," it said.

Despite his critical condition, the leader of the world's nearly 1.4 billion Catholics has striven to keep up with Church matters from his hospital suite on the Gemelli's 10th floor, according to the Vatican.

"In the morning, after receiving the Eucharist, he resumed work activities," the statement said.

- 'Praying for you' -

Francis worked on Monday too, receiving the Vatican's secretary of state Cardinal Pietro Parolin and his number two, Venezuelan Archbishop Edgar Pena Parra.

The pope approved the canonisation of two Venezuelan and Italian laymen who died in the early 20th century, while authorising the first steps towards sainthood for three 19th-century priests.

He also called the parish priest of Gaza's Catholic community, as he has routinely done since the war broke out, the Vatican said.

This time, he was thanking him for a video the parish sent him.

"The whole world is praying for you... and everyone wishes you good health," the priest said in the video, which was published on Vatican News and showed him surrounded by his flock.

Hundreds of faithful are expected to gather again in St Peter's Square on Tuesday evening, while special prayers for Francis will be celebrated at an Argentine church in Rome.

Honduran Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, a former coordinator of the pope's Council of Cardinals, told La Repubblica daily Tuesday he felt hopeful the pope would pull through.

"It's not yet time for him to go to heaven," Maradiaga said.

"He is someone who does not back down in the face of difficulty, does not get discouraged, does not freeze, and does not stop moving forward," he told the paper.

- 'Breath of fresh air' -

Well-wishers have left candles and photos outside the hospital, where a special prayer was led by Gemelli's chaplain on Monday.

In Buenos Aires, where the former Jorge Bergoglio served as archbishop before being made pope in 2013, hundreds of Argentines prayed for the pontiff.

Speaking in the plaza where Bergoglio used to rail against injustice and inequality, Archbishop Jorge Garcia Cuerva called Francis's papacy "a breath of oxygen for a world suffocated by violence, suffocated by selfishness, suffocated by exclusion".

"Let our prayer be that breath of fresh air that reaches his lungs so that he can recover his health," he said.

- Recovery time -

Doctors have cautioned that any recovery will take time and that Francis will likely stay in hospital beyond this week.

The pope, who had part of one lung removed as a young man, has increasingly suffered health complications in recent years.

He is prone to respiratory infections, is overweight and suffers knee and hip pain that has led to his reliance on a wheelchair.

"For an older person like Pope Francis, with all the added complications... you have to wait even longer for a complete recovery," Andreoni said.

N.Flores--SFF