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CORRECTION: Pope's Lung

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In some stories from 2005 and March 2013 about Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who became Pope Francis last month, The Associated Press erroneously reported that Bergoglio had a lung removed as a teenager.

Bergoglio’s sister, Maria Elena Bergoglio, former spokesman Guillermo Marco, and authorized biographer Sergio Rubin confirm that only part of one lung was removed. Rubin provides more details in his book “Pope Francis: Conversations with Jorge Bergoglio,” published last month. It says Bergoglio suffered an infection at 21, and that doctors removed the upper part of his right lung after finding three cysts.

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Argentine gays not thrilled with new pope

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While the appointment of Jorge Mario Bergoglio as pope fills many in Argentina with pride, members of the gay pride community are somewhat aghast.

Nearly three years before Argentina became known as home to the first Latin American pope, it made history as the first country in the region to approve gay marriage — an action that then-Cardinal Bergoglio actively opposed.

Esteban Paulon is president of the Argentine Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transsexuals. He says Bergoglio waged a “war of God” against a gay-marriage proposal headed for Congress.

But Paulon also acknowledges that Bergoglio first tried to reach a compromise.

Paulon and Pope Francis‘ biographer, Sergio Rubin, note that Bergoglio urged his bishops to accept gay civil unions as a compromise to gay marriage. They rejected the idea.

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Pope Francis' one lung shouldn't affect his duties

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The new pope has daunting challenges ahead ranging from the church sex abuse scandal to reinvigorating the flock.

And Francis will have to do it all with just one lung.

The Argentine pontiff lost the greater part of one lung to a teenage infection. “He feels it today,” says his authorized biographer Sergio Rubin. “He’s a little bit slowed by it, but he’s OK.”

Doctors said that losing one lung doesn’t necessarily compromise the pope’s health or reduce his life span, though it means no strenuous exercise since he no longer has as much air capacity as people with two lungs. “He probably wouldn’t be able to run marathons, but I don’t think that would be on his schedule,” said Dr. Peter Openshaw, director of the Centre for Respiratory Infection at Imperial College London. “Having one lung should be enough as long as there is no other disease in that lung.”

Openshaw didn’t think a papal schedule would be too taxing for Francis’ one lung, though he noted the pope’s rib cage might look slightly unusual. “His X-ray will probably look rather alarming, but understandable once you know he only has one lung,” he said.

Openshaw said Francis’ existing lung would probably have expanded to fill the space left by the missing one, and that his rib cage would have shrunk slightly in size. His diaphragm may also have moved up slightly higher than normal. But none of those changes should affect Francis’ normal activities, he said.

He said the pope’s remaining lung should be able to compensate for the missing one, similar to how parts of the brain may pick up functions of other regions damaged by a stroke.

“The other lung can gain capacity but there will be limits,” he said, comparing it to a car engine that now runs slightly slower. “You may not be able to accelerate as hard but it still works just as well.”

Experts said it would be rare nowadays to remove a lung. Antibiotics would be used to treat most lung infections including tuberculosis, though part of the organ might be removed to treat advanced lung cancer.

Back when Francis had his lung removed, the available antibiotics weren’t as powerful. “In the past, doctors used to try all kinds of strange things to try to treat lung infections,” said Dr. Jennifer Quint, a respiratory expert at London’s School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She said physicians even used to stick ping pong balls into peoples’ lungs in an attempt to starve the lung of oxygen, to kill the bacteria.

Quint said the fact that Francis appears so fit and healthy at 76 bodes well for his future.

“If he were going to have any major complications from the surgery (to remove the lung), he would have had them by now,” she said. She said Francis’ main challenge will be to keep his remaining lung healthy. “I would recommend a yearly flu vaccination and an occasional pneumonia vaccine to avoid infection,” she said.

Jeremy Ward, a professor of respiratory physiology at King’s College London, said …read more
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Argentine Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio named new pope

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Argentine Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected by his peers Wednesday as the new pope, becoming the first pontiff from the Americas.

He chose the name Francis, drawing connections to the humble 13th-century saint who saw his calling as trying to rebuild the church in a time of turmoil.

As the long-time archbishop of Buenos Aires, Francis has spent nearly his entire career at home in Argentina, overseeing churches and shoe-leather priests. In choosing a 76-year-old pope, the cardinals clearly decided that they didn’t need a vigorous, young pope who would reign for decades but rather a seasoned, popular and humble pastor who would draw followers to the faith and help rebuild a church stained by scandal.

Groups of supporters waved Argentine flags in St. Peter’s Square as Francis, wearing simple white robes, made his first public appearance as pope.

Chants of “Long live the pope!” arose from the throngs of faithful, many with tears in their eyes. Crowds went wild as the Vatican and Italian military bands marched through the square and up the steps of the basilica, followed by Swiss Guards in silver helmets and full regalia.

Francis appeared on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica just after a church official announced “Habemus Papum” — “We have a pope” — and gave Bergoglio’s name in Latin.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, good evening,” he said to wild cheers before making a reference to his roots in Latin America, which accounts for about 40 percent of the world’s Roman Catholics.

Francis asked for prayers for himself, and for retired Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, whose surprising resignation paved the way for the conclave that brought the first Jesuit to the papacy.

“You know that the work of the conclave is to give a bishop to Rome,” Francis said. “It seems as if my brother cardinals went to find him from the end of the earth. Thank you for the welcome.”

In one of his first acts as pope, Francis on Thursday morning planned to visit Benedict at the papal retreat in Castel Gandolfo south of Rome.

American Cardinal Timothy Dolan said Wednesday night at the North American College, the U.S. seminary in Rome, that Francis told fellow cardinals following the conclave that made him pope: “Tomorrow morning, I’m going to visit Benedict.”

The visit is significant because Benedict’s resignation has raised concerns about potential power conflicts emerging from the peculiar situation of having a reigning pope and a retired one.

Bergoglio has shown a keen political sensibility as well as the kind of self-effacing humility that fellow cardinals value highly, according to his official biographer, Sergio Rubin. He showed that humility on Wednesday, saying that before he blessed the crowd he wanted their prayers for him and bowed his head.

“Good night, and have a good rest,” he said before going back into the palace.

In a lifetime of teaching and leading priests in Latin America, which has the largest share of the world’s Catholics, Francis has been known for modernizing an Argentine church that had been among the most conservative in Latin America.

Like other Jesuit …read more
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Papal election stirs Argentina's 'dirty war' past

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Pope Francis is rarely talked about without mention of his humility, his reluctance to talk about himself. The self-effacement, admirers say, is why he has hardly ever denied one of the harshest allegations against him: That he was among church leaders who actively supported Argentina‘s murderous dictatorship.

It’s without dispute that Jose Mario Bergoglio, like most other Argentines, failed to openly confront the 1976-1983 military junta while it was kidnapping and killing thousands of people in a “dirty war” to eliminate leftist opponents.

But the new pope’s authorized biographer, Sergio Rubin, argues that this was a failure of the Roman Catholic Church in general, and that it’s unfair to label Bergoglio with the collective guilt that many Argentines of his generation still deal with.

“In some way many of us Argentines ended up being accomplices,” at a time when anyone who spoke out could be targeted, Rubin recalled in an interview with The Associated Press just before the papal conclave.

Some human rights activists accuse Bergoglio, 76, of being more concerned about preserving the church’s image than providing evidence for Argentina‘s many human rights trials.

“There’s hypocrisy here when it comes to the church’s conduct, and with Bergoglio in particular,” said Estela de la Cuadra, whose mother co-founded the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo activist group during the dictatorship to search for missing family members. “There are trials of all kinds now, and Bergoglio systematically refuses to support them.”

Bergoglio twice invoked his right under Argentine law to refuse to appear in open court in trials involving torture and murder inside the feared Navy Mechanics School and the theft of babies from detainees. When he eventually did testify in 2010, his answers were evasive, human rights attorney Myriam Bregman told the AP.

Bergoglio’s own statements proved church officials knew from early on that the junta was torturing and killing its citizens even as the church publicly endorsed the dictators, she said. “The dictatorship could not have operated this way without this key support,” she said.

Rubin, a religious affairs writer for the Argentine newspaper Clarin, said Bergoglio actually took major risks to save so-called “subversives” during the 1976-1983 dictatorship, but never spoke about it publicly before his 2010 biography, “The Jesuit.”

In the book, Bergoglio explained that he didn’t want to stoop …read more
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Argentina has very different papal candidates

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Both are the sons of Italian immigrants. Both are doctrinal conservatives. And both are known for their warm personalities.

But the two Argentine cardinals widely given an outside chance to become pope have had very different careers.

Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who would be the first Jesuit pope if chosen, has spent nearly his entire career at home in Argentina, overseeing churches and shoe-leather priests. Leonardo Sandri, who left for Rome 42 years ago, is a Vatican insider who has run the day-to-day operations of the global church’s vast bureaucracy and roamed the world as a papal diplomat.

The election of either of them as pope might help to reconcile two conflicting trends in the papal election: the push to return to the tradition of Italian popes, and the longing for a pontiff from the developing world.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: As the Roman Catholic Church prepares to elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI, The Associated Press is profiling key cardinals seen as “papabili” — contenders to the throne. In the secretive world of the Vatican, there is no way to know who is in the running, and history has yielded plenty of surprises. But these are the names that have come up time and again in speculation. Today: Jorge Mario Bergoglio and Leonardo Sandri.

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Bergoglio, 76, reportedly got the second-most votes after Joseph Ratzinger in the 2005 papal election, and he has long specialized in the kind of pastoral work that some say is an essential skill for the next pope. In a lifetime of teaching and leading priests in Latin America, which has the largest share of the world’s Catholics, Bergoglio has shown a keen political sensibility as well as the kind of self-effacing humility that fellow cardinals value highly, says his official biographer, Sergio Rubin.

Bergoglio would likely encourage the church’s 400,000 priests to hit the streets to capture more souls, Rubin said in an Associated Press interview. He is also most comfortable taking a low profile, and his personal style is the antithesis of Vatican splendor. “It’s a very curious thing: When bishops meet, he always wants to sit in the back rows. This sense of humility is very well seen in Rome,” Rubin said.

Bergoglio is known for modernizing an Argentine church that had been among the …read more
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