Pope Leo XIV says he will undergo surgery in the coming days to remove a nodule on his lung

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Leo XIV announced Sunday he will undergo surgery “in the coming days” to remove a nodule on his lung, in the first major health event of his 17-month pontificate.The 71-year-old Leo said the nodule was found at an early stage and was “circumscribed” or well-localized. The Vatican said Leo's expected recovery time from surgery would be a week.The American pope made the announcement during his Sunday noon blessing. He thanked the crowd for their closeness and entrusted himself to their prayers.The Vatican didn’t say exactly when the surgery would take place, other than in the early days of this week. Leo has one upcoming main event: the closing Mass on Wednesday of a weeklong conference on family ministry, but Vatican officials suggested he might miss it.A nodule can be benign or malignantA lung nodule is a small abnormal area measuring less than 3 centimeters (1 inch) that sometimes appears on a CT scan of the chest or abdomen, according to the American Cancer S