Pope Francis hospitalized for planned intestinal surgery

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican says Pope Francis has gone to a Rome hospital for scheduled surgery on his large intestine. The brief announcement Sunday afternoon didn’t say when the surgery would be performed but it said there would be an announcement when the surgery is complete. Just three hours earlier, Francis had cheerfully greeted the public in St. Peter’s Square and told them he will go to Hungary and Slovakia in September. A week earlier, Francis, 84, had used the same appearance to ask the public for special prayers for himself, which might have hinted at the planned surgery at Rome’s Gemelli Polyclinic. Francis is in generally good health, but did have part of one lung removed as a young man.