More than seven years after his resignation, the former pope Benedict XVI is offering a new back in the news. It is his state of health that is fueling concerns. At the age of 93 years, it is " extremely fragile ", according to an article in the daily regional German Passauer Neue Presse, which quotes a biographer of the former pope, Peter Seewald. Benedict XVI is suffering from erysipelas of the face, an infectious disease characterized by swelling, reddish, which causes severe itching and intense pain, reported the journal. "According to Seewald, the pope emeritus is now extremely fragile [...]. His intellectual ability and his memory are not affected, but his voice is barely audible, " wrote the Passauer Neue Presse.
Peter Seewald met Saturday in Rome Benedict XVI to present his biography, according to the newspaper. "During this meeting, the pope emeritus, in spite of his illness, he was optimistic and said that if its forces were rising again, it would perhaps be his pen ", he added.
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Benedict XVI visited his older brother Georg, who is very ill in Germany in June, marking his first trip outside Italy since his surprise resignation in 2013. Georg Ratzinger is dead two weeks later. The two brothers, both ordained priests on the same day in June 1951, were very close.
the First pope to resign in nearly 600 years, Benedict XVI, who had invoked reasons of health, leads a retired life in a small monastery in the Vatican since his resignation.
