Pope Francis told a Sunday audience at the Vatican “I truly feel great sorrow for having had to postpone” a July 2 trip to the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan.
The 85-year-old spiritual leader of the world’s Roman Catholics, who has been using a wheelchair in public appearances for the past month, said the schedule change was made “with great regret, due to problems with my leg.”
The trip had been scheduled for July 2, but its postponement was announced by the Vatican last week, which some observers said was an unusually short window for such changes.