Pope Leo XIV to have surgery to remove a small lung nodule

What the Pope said

Leo told the crowd on Sunday 11 October in plain words what his doctors had found. Here's how Vatican News translated it.

"Dear friends, during some recent medical examinations, the doctors found a small, localized nodule in my lung. It was detected at a very early stage and is well-localized. The doctors believe that it is best to intervene, so, following their advice, I have decided to undergo surgery to remove it. The operation is already scheduled to take place in the coming days. I thank you for your spiritual closeness and entrust myself to your prayers. Thank you, and happy Sunday!"

There's no drama in it, and that seems deliberate. He named the problem, said what he'd decided, and asked for prayer.

When and where

On Monday the Vatican filled in the details. Pope Leo will be admitted to the Agostino Gemelli Polyclinic "late in the morning" on Tuesday 13 October, Vatican News reported. In Adelaide, that's Tuesday evening.

Matteo Bruni, director of the Holy See Press Office, told journalists the examinations that found the nodule had been routine checks. He'd said on Sunday that "the operation is scheduled for the first days of this week and the estimated post-operative recovery time will be about one week."

Vatican correspondent Francesco Capozza said it was unclear whether it would take place on Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday morning, Infovaticana reported.

Gemelli is a hospital popes know well. St John Paul II and Pope Francis were both treated there, EWTN News notes, and its chapel holds a relic of John Paul II.

The Pope didn't let the news empty his diary straight away. He held all his scheduled audiences on Monday morning, Vatican News said, though he skipped the afternoon session of a meeting in the Paul VI Hall.

What changes this week

The Prefecture of the Papal Household has cancelled all of the Pope's audiences through Tuesday 20 October.

The biggest knock-on is for a gathering already under way at the Vatican, marking ten years since Pope Francis published Amoris Laetitia, his apostolic exhortation on love in the family. Leo was meant to preside at its closing Mass in St Peter's Square on Wednesday 14 October, with heads of Eastern Churches, presidents of bishops' conferences, married couples and experts.

Other dates have gone too. Leo has cancelled his appearance at a ceremony in Castel Gandolfo on Tuesday 13 October for the inaugural "Pope Leo XIV Sustainability Medal", an award set up by Villanova University, OSV News reported. The event will go ahead without him. He's also expected to miss his speech opening an international infertility conference, "The Splendor of Humanity: Preserving Fertility, Curing Infertility," on 16 October. Gemelli Hospital is one of its co-sponsors.

He's handed that Mass to Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization and the new dean of the College of Cardinals, Vatican News reported.

"During the Mass, we will pray especially for the Holy Father's health, as well as for families," said Jesuit Father Giacomo Costa, who oversees the meeting's method and advises the General Secretariat of the Synod.

There's a small, telling detail in what Costa said next. The meeting was due to publish a synthesis report at the end. The Pope has asked that it wait, so he can hear its conclusions himself and respond once he's out of hospital.

"I think this desire of his to listen is beautiful," Costa said.

What a lung nodule is

Plenty of people heard the word nodule on Sunday and worried. So it's worth being clear about what's known, and what isn't.

A nodule is a spot that shows up on a scan as a white patch against normal lung tissue, generally up to 30 millimetres across, EWTN News explains, drawing on reporting by its Spanish-language sister service ACI Prensa. More and more often, they're found by accident, when people are scanned before an operation or as part of a screening programme.

Most aren't cancer. Dr Elmer Huerta, a Peruvian oncologist based in the US and the first Latin American president of the American Cancer Society, pointed to a 2022 study that found 95% of lung nodules are benign. Cancerous nodules tend to show certain features on X-rays, CT and PET scans, Huerta said. Dr Bruno Vincenzi, who heads oncology at Rome's Campus Bio-Medico University Hospital, told ACI Prensa that a firm answer needs the tissue examined under a microscope.

The surgery itself is usually minimally invasive now. "The old thoracotomies, which meant opening the chest, are no longer done," Huerta said. "What is done now is minimally invasive robotic surgery, in which a half-centimeter opening is made between the ribs, the robot is introduced, and the operation is done with that."

How long recovery takes depends on how much tissue the surgeons remove, and that hasn't been made public. Both doctors quoted by EWTN News declined to guess about the Pope's own case. Huerta gave the advice he gives his own patients, to go step by step.

The Vatican hasn't said anything about the nature of the nodule beyond the Pope's own words, and we won't guess either.

The Church answers with prayer

The response came quickly, and it came from everywhere. Vatican News says the Pope has received messages of support from Churches and political leaders on all five continents.

In the United States, where Leo was born, Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City, president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, promised prayers within hours, OSV News reported.

"The bishops of the United States join with the faithful and all people of good will in praying for his good health," Coakley said. "May the hand of Pope Leo's surgeons be guided by the divine physician Jesus Christ."

"Please find a moment today, as I will, to offer a prayer for Pope Leo and his care team," he added.

Canada's bishops said they were united "with the faithful in prayer" and asked for the intercession of "the Blessed Virgin Mary, Health of the Sick." Cardinal Robert McElroy of Washington, in Rome for the Amoris Laetitia meeting, asked every priest in his archdiocese "to offer Mass for Pope Leo and his health in these days." Archbishop Ronald Hicks of New York, finishing a week-long pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago, said the Pope would have "an even greater remembrance in my prayers."

His own brothers

Leo is an Augustinian friar, and his order spoke like family.

"We believe strongly in the power of prayerful petitions," Father Joseph Farrell, the order's prior general, told OSV News. "The Augustinian brothers and sisters across the globe are praying for our brother Pope Leo XIV. We are praying also for the doctors and entire medical staff who will be assisting him in surgery in the coming days."

Father Tom McCarthy, prior provincial of the Our Mother of Good Counsel province, the Pope's own, said the friars "are very sad to hear that Pope Leo needs surgery."

"But we are grateful it was caught early," he said. "We are asking everyone to pray for Pope Leo."

Villanova University, the Pope's alma mater, said it "joins the global Church in prayer for Pope Leo as he prepares to undergo surgery."

And there's one story from OSV News that's hard to forget. Augustinian Father Robert Hagan said that at a Mass on Sunday at a Pennsylvania state prison, the inmate reading the prayers of the faithful added a petition of his own. "As Pope Leo prepares for his procedure, we pray for him, for his doctors, and in thanksgiving that all will go well," the man prayed.

"This fellow added that in on his own," Hagan said. "And I could tell he was a voice of the people."

Looking ahead

The Pope is still planning to travel. He has a pastoral visit to South America scheduled for 6 to 17 November, EWTN News reports, with stops in Uruguay, Argentina and Peru, according to OSV News. It would be the longest international trip of his pontificate, and the Vatican hasn't announced any changes to it. On Sunday he spoke as if it's still on. Greeting members of the Brotherhood of the Lord of Miracles in the square, he said, "Thank you for your prayer for the pastoral visit I will make to Peru."

Whether he can make that trip will depend on how the operation goes and how much the surgeons need to do. For now the request from Rome is the one Leo made himself on Sunday. Pray for him, and for the people looking after him.

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