Even in sickness, Pope Francis reached out to Gaza's Christians

World view

- By AARON BOXERMAN

Even as Pope Francis was hospitalized in the last months of his life, he still occasionally kept up what had been a near-nightly ritual: calling the hundreds of Palestinian Christians huddling in the only Roman Catholic church in the war-torn Gaza Strip.

Amid fear and bombardment, the Rev. Gabriel Romanelli, the Argentine parish priest at Holy Family Church in Gaza City, had received a call from Francis almost every evening last year to check in on the well-being of his flock in the devastated enclave.

It was an unusual amount of time for the spiritual leader of more than one billion Catholics to spend with such a small community. But Francis had long shown particular sympathy for Palestinian suffering, frequently calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

The video calls generally lasted for a few minutes, Romanelli said. He said the calls had been less frequent after the pope became ill, but that they remained important for members of the community. Francis would inquire about the situation at the church, and Palestinians who had sought shelter there would ask for a blessing or voice a message that they hoped he would convey to world leaders.

"The evenings became known as the pope's time," Romanelli said. "People would gather, even the young or teenagers, to see him."