Ahead of Saturday funeral, public viewing begins Wednesday for Pope Francis
The feast day of St. Peter and Paul: the day Francis signed his will in Rome, a holiday in Rome for the eternal life, and the dedication of the Basilica to Saint Luke the Evangelist
The feast day of Sts. is the day that Francis signed his will. Peter and Paul and a holiday in Rome. He wrote it because he thought that the sunset of his earthly life would bring with it lively hope in eternal life. He mentioned that there was suffering in the last part of his life. He had undergone surgery for colon cancer on the first time he came to Gemelli Hospital.
Prof. Andrea Arcangeli, the director of the Vatican’s health offices, wrote that the pope had arterial hypertension, multiple bronchiectasis and Type II diabetes, and that he had been affected by episodes of acute respiratory failure. These took place when he was in the hospital with pneumonia in both lungs.
Faithful from around the world are pouring into the Vatican to mourn Francis, who died Monday of a stroke and ‘cardiocirculatory collapse.’ He died at 88. Public viewing of his body will begin Wednesday in St. Peter’s Basilica, after his casket is taken by procession from the Vatican hotel where he lived.
In his will, Francis specified that “the tomb must be in the earth; simple, without particular decoration.” He asked that the tomb be placed in the aisle next to the Pauline Chapel, where an important Marian icon, the Salus Populi Romani, is located.
Tradition holds that the icon was made by Saint Luke the Evangelist, the patron saint of painters. It is an image Francis was particularly devoted to, continuing a Jesuit tradition. Jesuits have been able to foster devotion to the icon by distributing copies of it throughout the world, according to the basilica.
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Francis also visited St. Mary Major every time he returned to the Vatican after a hospital stay, including on March 23, when he left Gemelli Hospital after a 38-day stay. He didn’t get out of the car.
A tourist from Guadalajara, Mexico, Esquivel Telles, 55, got on a waitlist three months ago, for a group audience with Pope Francis. She’d prayed to him after being diagnosed with leukemia in 2017. Now in remission, she’s made pilgrimage to the Vatican, to give thanks.
It was a dream of mine to meet him. But now we have to say goodbye,” Esquivel Telles says, strolling the cobblestones of St. Peter’s Square with a rosary in her hands.
Ahead of that, tourists and locals lit candles and placed flowers, sympathy cards and children’s drawings around a pillar in St. Peter’s Square, and sang hymns.
“He was a very caring father, and revolutionary pope,” says Maria Munoz, 51, a tourist from Alicante, Spain. “He tried to change a church that is old-fashioned.”
His funeral service will be held at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday in St. Peter’s Square, in front of the 16th century basilica. It will be presided over by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the 91-year-old dean of the College of Cardinals.
The President and the first lady have confirmed that they will travel to Rome for the funeral. “We look forward to being there!” On social networking sites, Trump posted. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office said he would also attend.
On Tuesday, the Vatican also released the first photos of the pope in a red velvet-lined open casket. In one, he’s flanked by two Swiss Guards in striped uniforms. Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state, prays with him. The pope wears red vestments and his bishop’s miter.
The Vatican Publishing House on Tuesday released a preamble written by Francis in February of a book by Cardinal Angelo Scola, the auxiliary bishop of Milan. Reflections on old age.
“We must not be afraid of old age, we must not fear embracing becoming old, because life is life, and sugarcoating reality means betraying the truth of things,” the late pope wrote.
The Vatican’s camerlengo, Cardinal Farrell, wore a red velvet coffin: When Francis and his family moved to Rome
Until a new pope is named, the acting head of the Vatican is the camerlengo, Cardinal Kevin Farrell — a Dublin-born naturalized U.S. citizen. He’s in charge of sealing off the late pope’s apartment, destroying his symbolic fisherman ring and preparing the conclave, the process by which a new pope is elected.
The Vatican’s media office posted video to social media late Monday showing the doors of Francis’ apartment being tied shut with red ribbon, then sealed with red wax.
Catholic cardinals from around the world are making their way to the Vatican. The conclave is expected to take place within a couple of weeks after the pope dies.
They vote, often in several rounds over several days, on who should be the next pontiff. The Sistine Chapel is where their votes take place.
Francis simplified the procedures for a pope’s funeral last year, specifying that only one coffin should be used. Past popes were interred in three nesting coffins: one of wood, a second of lead and a third of wood.
The photos show Francis trying to shake up the status quo, but he did so cautiously. And so a look at the images reveals objects and figures that embody long-held traditions of the church.
Pope Francis tried to keep a small amount of the ordinary in his very extraordinary job and strip away some of the more ornate features of the role. The role has a lot of wealth and frills. He chose to remain in the Santa Marta apartment where he stayed when he came as a cardinal to Rome, rather than move to the traditional papal residence at the Vatican. He chose simpler outfits and kept his plastic watch.
ROME — The body of Pope Francis was moved this morning to lie in state at St. Peter’s Basilica. The body was placed in a red velvet-lined open casket and sung by a choir and cardinals.
At the church, crowded with visitors, Spanish priest Rubén Martínez spoke of the sense of anticipation that weighs in the air. He was in Rome just an hour before and headed to the church.
People were standing in a long line outside St. Peter’s Square. Some held umbrellas to shield them from the sun as they waited for their moment to enter St. Peter’s Basilica.
The Pope Francis’ body lies in state ahead of Saturday funeral: a prayer for Mardi Mauricio Harvey, his wife Margarita
“I wanted to see him alive,” said Margarita Harvey from El Salvador, who lives in Pennsylvania. I’d like to at least see his body. I’m praying for him. My soul is with him.
When Harvey enters the basilica, she’ll find Francis lying in a single wooden casket, dressed in red robes, holding a rosary and wearing the papal miter — the ceremonial head dress.
A few weeks after he became pope aids at the Vatican urged him to wear white trousers to match his white cassock, Austen Ivereigh, Pope Francis’ biographer, told NPR. He said no, not at all. I don’t want to look like a ice cream vendor.
Francis is fond of ordinary people. This was evident as he moved through the crowds in St. Peter’s Square this past Easter Sunday, the very day before he died. He was hugging people in the public in his popemobile, without a bulletproof glass barrier.
The Vatican now says Francis was so weak he’d worried about whether he could cope with the appearance. He thanked Massimiliano Strappetti for bringing him back to the square.
Source: Pope Francis’ body lies in state ahead of Saturday funeral
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President Trump has confirmed he will attend. It’s possible that they will meet again after the tense public exchange at the White House in February.
This will be Trump’s first foreign trip since his second term and the first time he’s in the same location as other key leaders like European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, since he caused widespread tumult and chaos in the financial markers by placing high import taxes.
He would often pray to the Salus Popoli Romani, the icon of the Virgin Mary holding baby Jesus before and after each trip out of Rome, during difficult times, such as the corona virus, and in the Basilica of St. Mary Major.
