FILE PHOTO: Members of the Order of the Knights of Malta arrive in St. Peter Basilica for their 900th anniversary in Vatican February 9, 2013. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi
ROME (Reuters) - They will not be drawing swords like their predecessors did 1,000 years ago, but battle lines have been drawn between conservatives and reformers in the Knights of Malta, the Catholic chivalric order and global charity.
Its former leader, Briton Matthew Festing, has returned to Rome for a decisive boardroom confrontation over its future this Saturday, defying a request to stay away by a representative of Pope Francis, who ordered his resignation in January.
