There has long been a Vatican taboo against openly talking about a conclave when a pope is sick: It’s considered gauche to speculate about the election of a new pope while

Vice President JD Vance acknowledged Pope Francis’ criticism of the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration, without responding to any of its specifics or to the pontiff’s apparent criticism of Vance’s own deployment of Catholic tradition to justify such policies.

The Vatican’s early Friday update also suggested a level of normalcy and routine as the 88-year-old pope continues recovering at Rome’s Gemelli Hospital.

The latest statement suggests that the 88-year-old is able to sit in his chair, eat normally and do what the Vatican calls "light work".

A man revered by millions as the “doctor of the poor” will be the first saint from Venezuela after Pope Francis approved a decree Tuesday (AP/ Juan Arraez)

Gandhi’s Scant Garb Bars Audience with Pope.” So read the headline of a New York Times report, from December 13, 1931, that the Vatican had cancelled a meeting between Pius XI and “the Indian nationalist leader” because the Pope thought he might be criticized “if he received the visitor in his usual scanty clothing.

Nuns pray in front of the statue of late Pope John Paul II outside Gemelli Hospital, where Pope Francis continues his treatment for pneumonia, in Rome, Italy. Poplar trees next to Sefton Park Allotments in Liverpool cast long shadows in the evening sun.

Vice President JD Vance acknowledged Pope Francis’ criticism of the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration

Images and messages wishing Pope Francis a swift recovery were projected Thursday night onto Rio De Janeiro's landmark Christ the Redeemer statue.

Russia-Ukraine war . Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky praised Ukraine’s “absolute heroism” as the country today marks the third anniversary of Russia’s full-scale

A man revered by millions as the “doctor of the poor” will be the first saint from Venezuela after Pope Francis approved a decree Tuesday. A date for the canonization of Dr. José Gregorio Hernández, who died in 1919,

A singer and a trumpeter performed a serenade of Ave Maria below Pope Francis' windows at Rome's Gemelli Hospital where he is being treated for double pneumonia.