Pope Francis Said He Didn't Want The Job

The amiable Pope said that he never wanted to be made pontiff and that he has decided not to live in the official papal apartments because of an aversion of being alone.

He was speaking at a gathering of children from Jesuit schools after being asked whether he had wanted to become leader of the Roman Catholic Church.

“Anyone who wants to be pope doesn't care much for themselves, God doesn't bless them. I didn't want to be pope,” he said.

He joked that he had chosen to eschew the grand apartments in the Apostolic Palace for “psychiatric reasons”.

“It’s not just a question of riches but also a personality issue. I need to live among people and if I lived on my own, perhaps a little isolated, it wouldn't do me good,” he said.

Instead he is living in a suite in the Casa Santa Marta, the Vatican’s only 'hotel’, a modern residence opposite the walls of St Peter’s Basilica which accommodates visiting prelates and lay people.