Rome, 30 July 2022 (dpa/MIA) – Pope Francis continues not to rule out resignation as head of the Catholic Church, he said in a wide-ranging interview. "The door is open. It is a very normal option," the 85-year-old told journalists as he flew back late Friday to Rome from his trip to Canada. He is not thinking of resigning right now, but that does not mean he cannot start the day after tomorrow, the Argentinian added. Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Francis' real name, also spoke about the state of his health. In the past six days, he could hardly take a handful of steps and sat in a wheelchair most of the time. The pope has been plagued by a knee injury for some time. "I don't think I can continue with the same rhythm of travel as before. Thinking of my age and my limitation, I have to take it easy," he explained. His knee problem could be solved with surgery, but Francis does not want to go under the knife again after the past procedure on his colon just over a year ago. "The whole problem is the anaesthesia." The pontiff said that the anaesthetic had left its mark in his last operation. "You don't play with anaesthesia." According to Francis, he still wants to travel. The trips just might have to be planned on a slightly smaller scale, he explained. In Canada, he had been visiting the Indigenous peoples since Sunday to ask for forgiveness for the violence and abuse they suffered as children in Church-run boarding schools. Reflecting on the treatment of Indigenous children at the schools, the pope described this as "genocide." Created by the state and run by the Church, the institutions aimed to adapt and convert the children to Christian society. The reality the children faced was one of violence, sexual abuse, hunger and disease. Hundreds of children died in the institutions. Starting in the 1880s, an estimated 150,000 Indigenous children were taken from their families and placed in the boarding schools, with the last ones closing only in 1996. The discovery of hundreds of unmarked children's graves on boarding school grounds in May last year caused a scandal around the world, although the disappearances of Indigenous children had been discussed in Canada for years. In 2015, a government-appointed commission described the crimes of the boarding school staff as "cultural genocide." "It is true. It is genocide," he said, after Indigenous groups criticized the fact that he had failed to describe the acts of Church officials as cultural genocide. He conceded that the word was not used but said he had described genocide and asked for forgiveness, the pope said. Genocide is a technical term, he said, but he did not use it because it had not crossed his mind.