Pope Francis’ funeral is set to begin, in a ceremony he helped reimagine

 

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis is being laid to rest Saturday in a ceremony reflecting his priorities as pope and wishes as pastor: Presidents and princes will attend his funeral in St. Peter’s Square, but prisoners and migrants will usher him into the basilica where he will be buried.

As many as 200,000 people are expected to attend the funeral, which Francis choreographed himself when he revised and simplified the Vatican’s rites and rituals last year. His aim was to emphasize the pope’s role as a mere priest and not “a powerful man of this world,” the Vatican said.

It was a reflection of Francis’ 12-year project to radically reform the papacy, to emphasize its pastors as servants, and to construct “a poor church for the poor.” It was a mission he articulated just days after his 2013 election and explained the name he chose as pope, in honor of St. Francis of Assisi, “who had the heart of the poor of the world,” according to the official decree of the pope’s life that was placed in his coffin Friday night.

Nevertheless, the powerful will be in attendance Saturday. U.S. President Donald Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron, the U.N. chief and European Union leaders are joining Prince William and the Spanish royal family in leading official delegations. Argentine President Javier Milei had the pride of place given Francis’ Argentine nationality, even if the two didn’t particularly get along and Francis alienated many Argentines by never returning home.

Francis is breaking with recent tradition and will buried in the St. Mary Major Basilica, near Rome’s main train station, where a simple underground tomb awaits him with just his name: Franciscus. As many as 300,000 people are expected to line the 4-kilometer (2.5 mile) motorcade route that will bring Francis’ casket from the Vatican through the center of Rome to the basilica after the funeral.

Francis, the first Latin American and first Jesuit pope, died Easter Monday at age 88 after suffering a stroke while recovering at home from pneumonia.

With his funeral, preparations can now begin in earnest to host the centuries-old process of electing a new pope, a conclave that will likely begin in the first week of May. In the interim, the Vatican is being run by a handful of cardinals, key among them Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the 91-year-old dean of the College of Cardinals who is presiding at the funeral and organizing the secret voting in the Sistine Chapel.

Crowds waited hours in line to pay their respects to Francis

Over three days this week, more than 250,000 people stood for hours in line to pay their final respects while Francis’ body lay in state in St. Peter’s Basilica. The Vatican kept the doors open through the night to accommodate them.

“He was an excellent, humble person who changed many laws and always for the better,” said a pilgrim from his native Argentina, Augustin Angelicola, as he waited on line. “Now it is a sad thing for the whole world that all this has happened. We did not expect it, it had to happen but not so soon.”

But even with the expanded hours, it wasn’t enough. When the Vatican closed the doors to the general public at 7 p.m. on Friday, mourners were turned away in droves.

A special relationship with the basilica

Even before he became pope, Francis had a particular affection for St. Mary Major. It is home to a Byzantine-style icon of the Madonna, the Salus Popoli Romani, to which Francis was particularly devoted, such that he would go pray before it before and after each of his foreign trips as pope.

He decided to have his tomb located in a niche next to the chapel housing the icon, with a reproduction of his simple silver pectoral cross over the marble tombstone.

The choice of the basilica is also symbolically significant given its ties to Francis’ Jesuit religious order. St. Ignatius Loyola, who founded the Jesuits, celebrated his first Mass in the basilica on Christmas Day in 1538.

The Vatican said 40 special guests would greet his casket on the piazza in front of the basilica, reflecting the marginalized groups Francis prioritized pope: homeless people and migrants, prisoners and transgender people.

“The poor have a privileged place in the heart of God,” the Vatican quoted Francis as saying in explaining the choice. The actual burial will be private, presided over by cardinals and a few close aides.

Italy is deploying more than 2,500 police and 1,500 soldiers to provide security, which also includes stationing a torpedo ship off the coast, and putting squads of fighter jets on standby, Italian media reported.

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