The Vatican reported Friday that he experienced sudden breathing problems that required “non-invasive mechanical ventilation” but that he remained “alert.”

Pope Francis, who has been hospitalised for two weeks battling double pneumonia, has spent another peaceful night and is now resting, the Vatican said on Friday. Francis, 88, was admitted to Rome's Gemelli hospital on February 14 with what was originally described as a bronchitis and was later revealed to have developed into something more serious.

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

Pope Francis’s health worsened significantly Friday afternoon as his respiratory condition was irritated and necessitated the return of mechanical ventilation. Earlier in the day, the pontiff “experienced an isolated episode of bronchospasm,

According to a Feb. 28 medical bulletin from the Holy See, after a morning spent in prayer, receiving the Eucharist, and doing respiratory physiotherapy, Pope Francis experienced in the early afternoon “an isolated crisis of bronchospasm” — a tightening of the muscles that line the airways in the lungs, causing wheezing and coughing.

Due to the complexity of the clinical picture, further days of clinical stability are needed to clarify the prognosis,” the Vatican said Thursday.