The photo is said to have been taken Sunday when Francis was co-celebrating Mass in the chapel of his hospital suite where he has been battling a health crisis.

For much of the church’s history, the pope’s body was closely associated with the sanctity of his office, as the papal historian Agostino Paravicini Bagliani described in detail in his 1994 book “The Pope’s Body.” Sanctity is often bound up with mystery, and so the head of the church’s health was shrouded in secrecy until the past century.

Pope Francis entered the fifth week of hospital treatment for double pneumonia Saturday very much looking ahead as he worked on a signature priority of his papacy and signs of his recovery remained on a positive trajectory.