Humble to the End

NOT SINCE 1924 had Rome seen anything like it. It was more than 100 years ago when the coffin of Pope Leo XIII made its way from St. Peter’s Basilica to the Basilica of St. John Lateran, which he had chosen for his final resting place. But a century later – on Saturday, April 26 – the streets of Rome were lined with more than 150,000 people, all seeking to say a final farewell to Pope Francis, a pope of the people.

The procession was filled with dramatic moments as his body passed iconic Roman landmarks, including the Forum and the Colosseum. But in one of the day’s most poignant scenes, history’s first Jesuit pope passed by the Church of the Gesù, the mother church of the Society of Jesus where the body of St. Ignatius of Loyola is buried.

Extraordinary sight

When the world woke to the news that Francis had died on April 21 – Easter Monday – it came as a shock. Although the pope had battled an ongoing respiratory illness that had hospitalized him for five weeks, he was believed to be on the road to recovery. Less than 24 hours earlier, he was in St. Peter’s Square, giving the traditional Easter blessing and making what would be his final circuit on the popemobile.

It was an extraordinary sight: the frail, 88-year-old Pope fighting through pain and illness to remain close to the people. But for a Pope who often spoke more with gestures than with words, it harkened back to the very first night he appeared on the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica after his election on March 13, 2013 and asked for the people of Rome to pray for him before he offered his own blessing.

When he appeared that evening, he joked that his brother cardinals had gone to the ends of the earth to find him – a reference to him becoming the first pope from the Global South. When St. Peter’s Square was filled with some 250,000 mourners for his funeral, it was clear that people had come from the ends of the earth to say thank you for his service.

Thousands from his homeland of Argentina waved flags. A family of nine from Ecuador who had stretched their budget to be in Rome and close to the pope. A woman from Los Angeles who spontaneously bought a flight to Rome so that she could say farewell to Francis, whom she described as “a brother to all.”

These were just a few of what Francis often described as “God’s holy, faithful people” who wanted to be close to the revolutionary leader who galvanized the Catholic Church by his message of God’s love and mercy.

Cardinal Re’s homily

Dignitaries also gathered – among them Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, Brazilian President Lula, Argentine President Javier Milei, US President Donald Trump, and former US President Joe Biden – a testament to Francis’ rare ability to unite even the most opposing figures.

But as Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the dean of the College of Cardinals, said during his homily for the funeral Mass: Francis was first and foremost “a pope among the people, with an open heart towards everyone.”

During his 20-minute funeral homily, the Italian cardinal recalled some of the most memorable scenes of the Francis papacy.

There was the Pope’s constant advocacy on behalf of migrants, he reminded the crowd, as evidenced by his 2016 Mass held at the US-Mexico border and his very first trip outside of Rome, in 2013, to the island of Lampedusa, where he condemned the “global indifference” to the number of migrants lost at sea. In April 2019, in a dramatic gesture he knelt to kiss the feet of South Sudan’s previously warring leaders as he urged them to not return to a civil war.

There was the Pope’s historic trip to Iraq in 2021, where he traveled amid the COVID-19 pandemic and became the first pontiff to ever visit the country so he could be in solidarity with the Christian community that was nearly decimated by the Islamic State. And there were his numerous visits to Muslim majority countries where Francis sought to deepen relations between inter-religious groups in an effort to foster greater human fraternity.

“He established direct contact with individuals and peoples, eager to be close to everyone, with a marked attention to those in difficulty, giving himself without reserve, especially to the marginalized – the least among us,” Re said.

Most importantly, Re said in tribute to the late pope, he was first and foremost a pastor with a commitment to a vision of a Church that was open to all.

“The guiding thread of his mission was also the conviction that the Church is a home for all, a home with its doors always open. He often used the image of the Church as a ‘field hospital’ after a battle in which many were wounded,” said the cardinal.

“A Church determined to take care of the problems of people and the great anxieties that tear the contemporary world apart; a Church capable of bending down to every person, regardless of their beliefs or condition, and healing their wounds,” he continued.

Simple liturgy

When Francis’ coffin was brought out from the Basilica to the piazza at the start of the Mass, there was spontaneous applause.

Despite the many VIPs present, Francis had arranged for a stripped-down funeral liturgy that reflected the farewell of a simple shepherd, not that of a sovereign leader.

His remains were placed in a simple wooden coffin, and all references to powerful sounding titles had been removed from the funeral rites.

The Gospel reading chosen for the occasion was John 21:15-19, where Jesus tells Peter – the first pope – that if he loved him he was to “feed my sheep.”

“Despite his frailty and suffering towards the end, Pope Francis chose to follow this path of self-giving until the last day of his earthly life. He followed in the footsteps of his Lord, the Good Shepherd, who loved his sheep to the point of giving his life for them,” said Cardinal Re. “And he did so with strength and serenity, close to his flock, the Church of God, mindful of the words of Jesus quoted by the Apostle Paul: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

The poor first

As the funeral ended, Francis’ coffin was taken through St. Peter’s Basilica one last time and placed not onto a lavish hearse, but onto an open-air truck — a former popemobile used during his 2016 visit to Mexico.

As it arrived at Santa Maria Maggiore – Francis’ beloved basilica, home to his favorite icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary, before which he had prayed more than 120 times as pope after every hospitalization and on many occasions long before he even became pope – his coffin was not greeted by the rich or the royals who had traveled to Rome for the funeral.

Instead, he was met by the least of these whom Francis had prioritized during his papacy: migrants, transgender people, the poor and homeless.

“Do not forget the poor,” Brazilian Cardinal Cláudio Hummes said to Francis right after his election as pope, whom he later credited for giving him the inspiration to take the 13th century saint as his namesake.

“The poor have a special place in the heart of the Holy Father, who chose the name Francis to never forget them,” the Vatican said when they announced who would be present to offer the Pope his final send-off.

Simple tomb

According to his wishes, Francis’ remains were placed in a simple marble tomb in the ground in an unsophisticated space that used to be a storage closet. The only inscription is his name in Latin: Franciscus.

Concluding his funeral homily, Cardinal Re reminded the mourners that “Pope Francis used to conclude his speeches and meetings by saying, ‘Do not forget to pray for me.’”

“Dear Pope Francis,” he continued, “We now ask you to pray for us.”

“May you bless the Church, bless Rome, and bless the whole world from heaven as you did last Sunday from the balcony of this Basilica in a final embrace with all the people of God, but also embrace humanity that seeks the truth with a sincere heart and holds high the torch of hope,” he said. Amen, indeed.