Praying for slice of life: Pope wants to go out and get pizza, too

Pope Francis believes his papacy will be short. Photo / AP

Restrictions to freedom the biggest downside of being pontiff, says Pope Francis

The freedom to pop out for a pizza is the main thing Pope Francis misses two years after being elected the head of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics.

In a wide-ranging interview marking his two years on the Seat of St Peter, the Argentine Pope said the only thing he regretted about being made pontiff were the restrictions to his movement.

"The only thing I would like is to go out one day, without being recognised, and go to a pizzeria," he told a Mexican television channel.

"In Buenos Aires I was a rover. I moved between parishes and certainly this habit has changed. It has been hard work to change."

The Pope may not have to wait too long for his pizza yearning to be satisfied - he is scheduled to visit Naples on March 21.

Two years to the day after being elected in a secret conclave of his fellow cardinals held in the Sistine Chapel, he was asked if he liked being pontiff and replied, "I don't mind."

When he had travelled to Rome to attend the conclave, he had taken a small suitcase and expected to be on the first plane back to Argentina after the election of a successor to Benedict XVI, who became the first pope since medieval times to resign voluntarily.

Pope Francis, 78, said he had an intuition that because of his age his papacy would be a short one.

"I have the feeling my pontificate will be brief: four or five years, even two or three. Two have already passed. It is a somewhat strange sensation. Maybe it's like the psychology of the gambler who convinces himself he will lose so he won't be disappointed and if he wins, is happy."

He hailed Pope Benedict's decision to resign as courageous, suggesting he, too, might consider resigning if he felt he no longer had the strength to do the job.

Alluding to the resistance he has encountered trying to clean up the Vatican's finances, he described the Curia, the Holy See's governing body, as "the last court in Europe".

"The others have been democratised, even the most classic among them. There is something in the papal court that maintains a somewhat atavistic tradition."