VATICAN CITY, March 15 (Reuters) - Pope Francis, at 87

increasingly weak and wobbly, takes a trip down memory lane and

speaks of his hopes for the Roman Catholic Church's future in a

new book reflecting on his life and its intersection with major

world events.

"Life - My Story Through History," a memoir written with

Italian journalist Fabio Marchese Ragona and published by

HarperCollins, goes on sale on March 19, the 11th anniversary of

Francis' installation as the first Latin American pope.

While offering little that is new, the 230-page book is a

breezy, conversational-style read starting with his childhood in

Buenos Aires to today.

It is punctuated by events including World War Two, the

Holocaust, the Cold War, the 1969 Moon landing, the 1989 fall of

the Berlin Wall, the September 11, 2001 attacks and the

resignation of Pope Benedict XVI in 2013.

Francis, whose health recently has shown signs of strain

with successive bouts of bronchitis, a spate of hospital stays

and difficulty walking, repeats that he has no intention of

resigning like his predecessor unless "a serious physical

impediment were to arise".

He jokes that while some of his conservative critics "may

have hoped" he would have announced a resignation after a

hospital stay, there is little or no risk of it because "there

are many projects to bring to fruition, God willing".

He again defends his recent decision to allow blessings for

people in same-sex relationships, reiterating that they are not

blessings for the union itself but of individuals "who seek the

Lord but are rejected or persecuted".

The Church, he says, does "not have the power to change the

sacraments created by the Lord" and that "this (the blessings)

does not mean that the Church is in favour of same-sex

marriage".

HOPING FOR AN EMBRACING CHURCH

Addressing the controversy about the recent ruling, he says:

"I imagine a mother Church that embraces and welcomes everyone,

even those who feel they are in the wrong and have been judged

by us in the past".

Francis writes that even if some bishops refuse to offer

blessings for those in same-sex relationships, as in Africa, "it

doesn't mean that this is the antechamber to schism, because the

Church's doctrine is not brought into question".

Throughout the book he leans on historical events as

backdrops to make appeals relating to current, sometimes

similar, situations.

Speaking of World War Two, he writes that still today "Jews

continue to be stereotyped and persecuted. This is not

Christian; it's not even human. When will we understand that

these are our brothers and sisters?"

Reflecting on the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States by

Islamists, he writes, "It is blasphemous to use the name of God

to justify slaughter, murder, terrorist attack, the persecution

of individuals and entire populations - as some still do. Nobody

can invoke the name of the Lord to wreak evil."

He dismisses as "fantasy, obviously invented", recent

reports by conservative American Catholic media that he would

change the rules of conclaves to allow nuns and lay people to

enter conclaves to choose future popes.

On the lighter side, he speaks of the controversial "Hand of

God" goal by fellow Argentine Diego Maradona at the 1986 World

Cup soccer final against Germany, which the referee allowed,

presumably because he did not notice Maradona had used his hand.

Years later, when Maradona visited the pope at the Vatican,

"I asked him, jokingly, 'So, which is the guilty hand?'" Francis

writes.