Thousands line streets of Rome to bid final farewell to Pope Francis

ROME (CNS) — The casket bearing the body of Pope Francis made its final journey through the streets of Rome accompanied by applause and shouts of gratitude from thousands of mourners.

After the funeral Mass April 26, pallbearers carried Pope Francis’ coffin through St. Peter’s Basilica, stopping briefly at the steps leading to St. Peter’s tomb before placing it on a retrofitted popemobile parked outside.

Hundreds awaited outside and applauded as the vehicle, accompanied by four police officers on motorbikes, left the grounds of Vatican City for the last time.

According to the Vatican and Italian police, some 150,000 people watched the pope’s casket pass by.

Along the wide boulevard in front of Torre Argentina, where Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 A.D., tourists and bystanders packed the streets, some teetering on top of the stone walls around the ancient site. Residents were leaning out of their upper-story apartment windows, everyone camera-ready. When the motorcade passed, people clapped and cheered, some shouting “Grazie, Papa Francesco” (“Thank you, Pope Francis) and “Viva il papa.” (“Long live the pope”).

The cortegé bearing the first Jesuit pope passed by the Gesu Church, the mother church of the Society of Jesus in Rome’s historic center, where the body of the order’s founder, St. Ignatius of Loyola, is buried.

Among the tens of thousands of people hoping to catch a glimpse of the papal casket outside Rome’s famed Colosseum was a group of 50 young people from the Diocese of Verona who were in Rome for the Jubilee of Adolescents.

For 23-year-old Samuele Simoni, the death of Pope Francis, which happened while the group made their way to Rome for the Jubilee pilgrimage, was “unimaginable.”

Speaking to Catholic News Service, Simoni said bidding the pope farewell along the route to his tomb was a way for the group to witness “the strength of the church in such an important time of mourning.”

Pope Francis was “an important and influential figure” in the lives of young people, and to join others in bidding farewell to the pontiff was “definitely a time in which they could also fully experience a bit of the Jubilee,” he said.

“People often think of the Jubilee as seeing the pope in a different way. Yet, it is certainly an emotional moment of prayer that is both strong and beautiful,” Simoni told CNS. “For them, it will truly remain an indelible memory in their hearts.”

When the casket arrived at Rome’s Basilica of St. Mary Major, pallbearers carried it in a solemn procession down the central nave.

Among the cardinals present for the burial were: Cardinals Giovanni Battista Re, dean of the College of Cardinals; Roger M. Mahony, retired archbishop of Los Angeles, and ranking member of the order of cardinal priests; Dominique Mamberti, former prefect of the Apostolic Signature and ranking member of the order of cardinal deacons; Stanislaw Rylko, archpriest of the Basilica of St. Mary Major; Rolandas Makrickas, coadjutor archpriest of the basilica; Pietro Parolin, secretary of state under Pope Francis; Baldassare Reina, papal vicar of Rome; and Konrad Krajewski, the papal almoner.

Before reaching the pope’s final resting place, the pallbearers stopped in front of the chapel where Pope Francis often laid flowers and prayed before the icon of Mary. This time, two boys and two girls carried baskets of white flowers and set them before the altar under the Marian icon.

The pallbearers then made their way to Pope Francis’ tomb, where Cardinal Farrell presided over the burial rite. Earlier in the week, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni told journalists that the actual burial would not be broadcast live.

In a statement released April 24, the Vatican press office said “a group of the poor and needy will be present on the steps” leading to the papal basilica to welcome his casket.

Corriere della Sera also reported that five prisoners from Rome’s Rebibbia prison were given special permission to be present at the basilica and attend the pope’s burial.

The pope had a special affection for prisoners, celebrating Holy Thursday Mass almost every year at a prison or jail. On April 17, just four days before his death, Pope Francis visited Rome’s Regina Coeli jail.

According to Avvenire, the newspaper of the Italian bishops’ conference, Auxiliary Bishop Benoni Ambarus of Rome, who was charged with prison pastoral care for the diocese, revealed the late pope had recently made a personal donation of 200,000 euros ($228,100) to a pasta factory run by the prisoners of Rome’s Casal del Marmo prison.

Saying the prisoners felt orphaned after the pope’s death, Bishop Ambarus said he was “working so that (the pope’s) favorite children can be at the funeral. We will see what we can do.”

The Basilica of St. Mary Major was a dear to Pope Francis throughout his pontificate as he would often go to pray before the icon “Salus Populi Romani” (“Health — or salvation — of the Roman people”), especially before and after his papal trips.

At a briefing with journalists outside the basilica April 26, Cardinal Makrickas said the pope, who was initially reluctant to be buried outside of St. Peter’s Basilica, told him in May 2022 that the “Virgin Mary told me, ‘Prepare the tomb.'”

The Vatican previewed an image of the tomb, which was created with marble from the northern Italian region of Liguria, the land of the late pope’s grandparents, and inscribed with the Latin version of his name: Franciscus. It also featured a large reproduction of his pectoral cross.

In his final testament, which was published by the Vatican shortly after his death April 21, the pope expressed his wish to be buried at the basilica dedicated to Mary to whom he had entrusted his “priestly and episcopal life and ministry.”

The pope further explained his reasons in his autobiography, “Hope,” which was published in January. In it, he said he would not be buried in Saint Peter’s Basilica because “the Vatican is the home of my last service, not my eternal home.”

“I will go in the room where they now keep the candelabra close to the Regina della Pace (Queen of Peace) from whom I have always sought help, and whose embrace I have felt more than a hundred times during the course of my papacy,” he wrote.

Contributing to this story were Carol Glatz and Justin McLellan in Rome.

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