Pope Leo XIV announced this Sunday, at the end of the Angelus, that he will undergo surgery in the coming days to remove a circumscribed nodule in his lung. It was the Pope himself who delivered the news from the window of the Apostolic Palace, before the faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square, after greeting the groups of pilgrims and before bidding farewell.
“Recently, during some check-ups, the doctors found a circumscribed nodule in my lung. It was detected at a very early stage and is well localized,” the Pontiff explained. “The doctors consider it appropriate to intervene and, following their advice, I have decided to undergo surgery to remove it. The procedure is already scheduled for the coming days.” Pope Leo XIV thanked the faithful for their “spiritual closeness” and entrusted himself to their prayers. He did not specify the nature of the nodule, in which of the two lungs it is located, the type of procedure, the hospital where it will be performed, or the date.
Pope Leo XIV turned 71 on September 14. The announcement comes less than four weeks before the start of his apostolic journey to Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru, whose official program begins on November 6 in Montevideo and concludes in Peru, with stops in Lima and Chiclayo, the diocese he led between 2015 and 2023. Shortly before speaking about his health, the Pope had greeted the members of the Brotherhood of the Lord of Miracles in Rome and thanked them for their prayers for the pastoral visit he will make to Peru. He made no reference to changes in the schedule.
The first-person announcement has a precedent in John Paul II, who on July 12, 1992, announced during the Angelus that he would be admitted to the Gemelli Polyclinic in Rome that same night for diagnostic tests. Three days later, he underwent surgery to remove a benign intestinal tumor. In the case of Francis, it was the Holy See Press Office that reported on the two operations he underwent as Pope in the same hospital: colon surgery in July 2021 and abdominal hernia surgery in June 2023.
Before the Marian prayer, the Pope commented on the Gospel of the wedding banquet that a king prepares for his son (Mt 22:1-14). He quoted Saint Thomas Aquinas to recall that good tends by its nature to spread, “bonum diffusivum sui,” and referenced the reading of Saint Jerome, who identifies the king with the Father, the bridegroom with Christ, and the bride with the Church. The banquet hall, he explained, represents our churches, our homes, and the places where we live, where “each day the King’s Son, Jesus Christ, once again declares His love to us and awaits our yes.”
After the Angelus, he recalled the beatification of Sister Maria Ignazia Isacchi, founder of the Congregation of the Ursuline Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, celebrated on Saturday in Mantua, and made an appeal to the parties in conflict in Ukraine to allow the safe transport of grain across the Black Sea, because “the daily bread of millions of people cannot be held hostage by war.” Among the groups he greeted were the Hakuna association of the faithful and the Jesús María Spain Alumnae.
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