Time-honored rituals, drafted and refined over centuries, allow for ritual mourning and provide order at a dramatic moment of ...

The pope has suffered from pneumonia in both lungs and experienced a “long asthmatic respiratory crisis” over the weekend.

While the Vatican has detailed laws and rituals to ensure the transfer of power when a pope dies or resigns, they do not ...

The Vatican says Pope Francis remains in critical condition but has showed slight improvement in laboratory tests.

The Vatican says Pope Francis remains in critical condition and blood tests show early kidney failure but he remains alert ...

The Vatican press office said there were "no episodes of asthmatic respiratory crisis" on Monday, and some laboratory tests ...

Pope Francis' doctors "are prudently maintaining their cautious prognosis" as the pontiff's condition of respiratory and ...

A scholar of global Catholicism writes how Francis has opened the church to the outside world in ways no pope had done before ...

Pope Francis, head of the Roman Catholic Church, has held his title for 12 years. What to know about the Jesuit.

ROME and LONDON -- Pope Francis was "resting" on Monday morning after spending his 10th night in the hospital, the Vatican ...