Pilgrims arrive in St. Peter’s Sq. on the Vatican, Tuesday, April 22, 2025.
Francisco Seco/AP
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Francisco Seco/AP
VATICAN CITY — Rosa del Carmen Esquivel Telles was supposed to fulfill the pope in the present day.
A vacationer from Guadalajara, Mexico, Esquivel Telles, 55, acquired on a waitlist three months in the past, for a gaggle viewers with Pope Francis. She’d prayed to him after being identified with leukemia in 2017. Now in remission, she’s made pilgrimage to the Vatican, to present 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 Sq. with a rosary in her fingers.
Devoted from world wide are pouring into the Vatican to mourn Francis, who died Monday of a stroke and ‘cardiocirculatory collapse.’ He was 88. Public viewing of his physique will start Wednesday in St. Peter’s Basilica, after his casket is taken by procession from the Vatican resort the place he lived.
Forward of that, vacationers and locals lit candles and positioned flowers, sympathy playing cards and kids’s drawings round a pillar in St. Peter’s Sq., and sang hymns.
“He was a very caring father, and revolutionary pope,” says Maria Munoz, 51, a vacationer from Alicante, Spain. “He tried to change many things in a church that’s antiquated.”
The pope’s funeral will likely be Saturday
The Vatican says the pope’s funeral will likely be Saturday at 10 a.m. native time, celebrated by the dean of the School of Cardinals, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re.
In a break from custom, Francis’ final testomony stipulates that his burial is not going to be in St. Peter’s Basilica, however as an alternative within the Basilica of Saint Mary Main, a smaller church in a bustling immigrant-area of Rome.
After each international journey, Francis would go to the basilica to hope earlier than a Byzantine-style portray of the Virgin Mary. He was final there about 10 days in the past.
There are previous popes buried there — however not for greater than 350 years.
Amongst those that’ve confirmed they will journey to Rome for the funeral are President Trump and the primary woman, Melania. “We look forward to being there!” Trump posted on social media. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s workplace stated he would additionally attend.
First pictures of the pope in his casket, and a few of his final written phrases
On Tuesday, the Vatican additionally launched the primary pictures of the pope in a purple velvet-lined open casket. In a single, he is flanked by two Swiss Guards in striped uniforms. In one other, the Vatican’s secretary of state, Pietro Parolin, prays alongside him. The pope wears purple vestments and his bishop’s miter.
The pictures had been taken throughout a ceremony Monday night time to certify the pope’s dying.
The Vatican Publishing Home additionally Tuesday launched a preface written by Francis in February of a e-book in Italian by Cardinal Angelo Scola, archbishop emeritus of Milan, entitled ‘Awaiting a New Starting. Reflections on Previous Age.”
In it, Francis writes that he finds “resonance” with the author’s topic of aging — and shares his own reflections.
“We should not be afraid of previous age, we should not worry embracing turning into previous, as a result of life is life, and sugarcoating actuality means betraying the reality of issues,” the late pope wrote.
The book would be available in bookstores starting Thursday, the Vatican said.
Looking ahead to the conclave
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 getting ready the conclave, the method by which a brand new pope is elected.
The Vatican’s media workplace posted video to social media late Monday displaying the doorways of Francis’ residence being tied shut with purple ribbon, then sealed with purple wax.
Catholic cardinals from world wide are making their technique to the Vatican. Their conclave is anticipated to be held inside 15 to twenty days of the pope’s dying.
They vote, typically in a number of rounds over a number of days, on who must be the subsequent pontiff. Their votes happen within the Sistine Chapel and are fully secret.
