Pope Francis presides over the Palm Sunday mass hours after being discharged

Just one day after being discharged after suffering from bronchitis, Pope Francis presided over a new Palm Sunday masswith about 30,000 faithful filling Saint Peter’s Square for another year.

Francisco, 86 years old, was three days admitted to the Gemelli hospitaland now begins a week, Holy Week, especially loaded with commitments and which will conclude with the mass on Easter Sunday, in the same Plaza de San Pedro, on April 9.

The pope’s last appearance in St. Peter’s Square was for his regular Wednesday public audience. That same day he was transferred to the Rome Polyclinic after feeling unwell.

Before the mass, Francis was taken on the popemobile to the center of the square, at the foot of the obelisk, to bless the olive branches and palms that the faithful, nuns and members of the Curia had carried in procession, recalling the triumphal entry of Jesus of Nazareth in Jerusalem.

Already during the mass — officiated by the Argentine cardinal Leonardo SandriFrancis took his place in a chair before the towering obelisk as a procession of cardinals in brilliant red robes and other worshipers made its way through the square. His voice sounded strong when opening the ceremony, although he went awayweakening as the ceremony progressed.

Throughout his homily, the pope defended the “abandoned” of the world: “No one can be marginalized”, he said before the thousands of faithful gathered. “Abandoned Jesus asks us to have eyes and a heart for the abandoned”.

In this sense, the Supreme Pontiff also recalled that “the verb ‘abandon’ in the Bible is strong” and “appears in moments of extreme pain”, which is why the memory of Christ should move his followers to “seek and love him in the abandoned” of our time.

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