(CNN) – Pope Francis said his predecessor Pope Benedict, the 95-year-old former pontiff who resigned nine years ago, is “very ill” after his health deteriorated on Wednesday.
Continued reporting: Vatican says retired Pope Benedict XVI’s health ‘deteriorating’
“I would like to ask all of you for a special prayer for Pope Emeritus Benedict, who supports the Church in his silence. He is very ill,” Francis said during his general audience at the Vatican on Wednesday.
“We ask the Lord to comfort and sustain him to the end in this witness of love for the Church.”
A Vatican spokesperson later confirmed that “there has been a deterioration in recent hours due to the increasing age (Benedict).
“The situation is currently under control and is being constantly monitored by his doctors,” spokesman Matteo Bruni said, adding that after his general audience, Francis visited his predecessor at the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in Vatican City.
In 2013, Pope Benedict XVI shocked the world by making the almost unprecedented decision to resign from his post, citing “advanced age.”
Benedict’s announcement marked the first time a pope has resigned in nearly 600 years. The last pope to abdicate before his death was Gregory XII, who resigned in 1415 to end a civil war within the Catholic Church in which more than one man claimed to be pope.
In 2020, the Vatican said Benedict was suffering from a “painful but not serious condition”, following reports in German media that he was ill.
Two years earlier, in a rare public letter published in the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, Benedict wrote that “while my physical strength is slowly declining, inwardly I am on a pilgrimage Home.”
Benedict’s legacy has been clouded by recent research into his time as archbishop of Munich and Freising, between 1977 and 1982, after a Church-commissioned report into abuse by Catholic clergy there was published in January.
The report found that he had been informed of four cases of sexual abuse involving minors – including two during his stay in Munich – but failed to take action, and that he had attended a meeting about an abusive priest.
Benedict later walked back these accusations, admitting that he had attended the meeting but denying that he deliberately concealed his presence.