VATICAN CITY (AP) — Even as Italian health authorities demanded that people to stay home as much as possible to battle the country’s severe coronavirus outbreak, Pope Francis left the Vatican to make a surprise visit to two churches.
The Vatican says the pope’s trip included a brief stroll Sunday on a main Rome street to pray for the end of the coronavirus pandemic. The pope did a stretch of the street “as of on a pilgrimage,” Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said.
Francis prayed in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, then went to a church which has a crucifix carried in a 1522 procession in Rome when the city was stricken with plague.
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