Pope’s health forces us to think of a «plan B» for the celebration of Holy Week

Pope Francis continues to improve his respiratory problems, but his hospitalization will still be long and after discharge he will have to keep a long convalescence in his residence, the Santa Marta house, so that in the Vatican one thinks of a «plan B» for the next celebrations of Holy Week.

The press office of the Holy See has specified that at the moment there is nothing decided and that the speculations that appear these days in the media on how the rites of the Vatican Holy Week will be developed «are only hypothesis.»

The bilateral pneumonia that keeps Francisco admitted to the Gemelli Hospital in Rome since February 14 is «under control», although «not yet eliminated», mechanical ventilation during the night is no longer necessary and the next medical part will not be published until next week.

A gradual but slow improvement that does not invite you to wait in a hospital discharge shortly. In 2023, the Argentine pontiff presided over all Holy Week ceremonies one day after leaving the hospital for bronchitis, but this time it cannot be so.

Therefore, in the Vatican a possible ‘Plan B’ has already been studied, as a hypothesis, which could include, if necessary, the celebration of Holy Week rites without the Pope, seen that it is the most intense period of the celebrations of the Catholic Church.

The events will begin on April 13 with the Mass of Palm Sunday, while the Vatican Holy Week- from April 17 to 21- begins with Holy Thursday, when there are two masses, one in the morning and one in the afternoon and the washing of the feet, an act in which Francisco used to go to a Roman prison.

While on Good Friday there are two other celebrations, including the Via Crucis in the Colosseum in the afternoon, and on Holy Saturday the vigil is celebrated, a ceremony of more than three hours.

And there is also the Easter Mass of Easter Sunday, which culminates with the Urbi et Orbi blessing from the lodge of the blessings of the Basilica of San Pedro.

According to the alternative plan that some media have published, some cardinals have been identified to celebrate the rites on behalf of the Pope, a little as was done in 2005, in the last period of the life of John Paul II, when already very sick by Parkinson, the task was entrusted to his closest collaborators. Karol Wojtyla appeared only resurrection Sunday from the window of his study, but without being able to speak.

The delegar scheme in the cardinals is already being used at the masses planned for jubilee and also in the Celebration of the Ash, when he celebrated the Apostolic Penitentiary, Angelo of Donatis.

In the Holy Week of the year that Wojtyla died, each cardinal delegated by the Pope read a greeting of San Juan Pablo II and pronounced his own homily, while the then Secretary of State, Angelo Sodano, on Sunday of Resurrection celebrated Mass in the square and read the Urbi et Orbi message.

This time, perhaps the Pope is already recovering on those dates, so a way that could be present at some important moments but without participating in the long ceremonies, such as with videosjesajes or direct connections from the chapel of his residence, would be studied.

According to some speculations, that the Vatican has labeled as a hypothesis, Francisco will commission the task of celebrating in his name some cardinals such as the Secretary of State, Pietro Parolin; the dean of the Cardenalicio College, Giovanni Battista Re; The Vicar of Rome, Bado Reina or Donatis.

While the Secretary of State, Parolin, as in 2005, would also be in charge of reading in his name the message of Urbi et Orbi, in which references to the crises and wars that the world are going through, although it will not do so from the balcony of the Basilica because that is a place only reserved for the potatoes.

EFE