AFTER the death of Pope Francis, more than 100 of the 135 cardinals who will elect a new Pope had arrived in Rome by Wednesday to prepare for his funeral and the subsequent conclave in May.
The body of the Pope, who died on Monday from a cerebral stroke and irreversible cardiovascular collapse, is lying in state in an oak coffin in St Peter’s Basilica, which is already attracting large numbers of visitors for the Church’s current Jubilee Year.
His funeral on Saturday morning, to be attended by dozens of heads of state and government, will mark the start of the formal Novendiales, or nine days of mourning, until the conclave to elect his successor begins.
Throughout his public life, Pope Francis was known for taking a less formal approach to the papacy. Last year, he approved a simplified papal funeral. The Pope’s final will, published on Monday, confirmed his wish to be buried in an aisle of St Mary Major Basilica, in Rome, in a modest tomb inscribed with the single word “Franciscus”.
The Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales issued guidance for liturgies, as well as posters and prayer cards, noting on its website how the Pope had been “a champion of ecclesial reform” and “advocate for the poor and refugees”, and had believed that “care for people” should always “trump financial gain”. It recalled the Jesuit Pope’s vision of “a simple Church focused on evangelisation”, as well as his message “that God’s love was for everyone, including those who felt alienated from the Church”.
Bishops in Ireland joined others worldwide in opening an online book of condolence. The RC Archbishop of Armagh, the Most Revd Eamon Martin, said in a message that Francis had “built friendships across religious divides”, pursuing a vision shaped by Latin America’s “theology of the people”, which was “not one of rigid structures or distant authority, but of a Church committed to encounter and deep solidarity with humanity. . .
“He insisted on reform of the Curia and of the global Church’s safeguarding procedures, courageously confronting the terrible sins and crimes of abuse in the Church and its traumatic impact on victims. Pope Francis was not just a leader of Catholics, or even of Christians; rather, he was a global leader who spoke with much needed balance and authority on behalf of countless people of goodwill around the world. He went the extra mile in reaching out to other Christian denominations and world faiths”.
In Scotland, the President of the Bishops’ Conference, the Bishop of Paisley, the Rt Revd John Keenan, paid tribute to the Pope’s humble “informal style”, and said that he had provided “a voice for the voiceless and all those who find themselves on the margins”, while encouraging the Church to “find a conciliatory approach to those of different beliefs and lifestyles”.
The President of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Most Revd Timothy P. Broglio, said that Pope Francis had brought “experience and vision” as the first pope from the Americas, while the head of the Australian Bishops’ Conference, Archbishop Timothy Costelloe of Perth, acknowledged that the Pope’s 12 years in office had not been “without controversy” among those who feared that his calls for openness were “putting at risk the integrity of the Church’s faith and moral teaching”.
In the Philippines, where RCs make up most of the population of 110 million, the Pope’s death was marked by the tolling of church bells. The President of the Bishops’ Conference, Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David, told church members in a pastoral message that the Pope had often “chosen the dusty road toward the peripheries rather than the comfort of the centre” while walking “as a shepherd with his people”, and had reminded Catholics “that the heart of the Gospel beats most strongly where pain, poverty, and exclusion dwell”.
In Latin America, currently home to 40 per cent of the world’s 1.4 billion Roman Catholics, a week of official mourning was declared by President Javier Milei in the Pope’s native Argentina, where the Bishops’ Conference praised him as a man “who knew how to guide the universal Church with evangelical firmness and unconditional love for the poor and suffering”.
The President of the Episcopal Council of Latin America and the Caribbean, Cardinal Jaime Spengler, recalled the Pope’s eight pilgrimages to the region, saying that he had “renewed the missionary impulse” and launched “unprecedented processes”.
In a statement with other church leaders, Cardinal Spengler said that the Pope had also “suffered the cross of misunderstanding and rejection”, but had sought “the unity of the Church in the diversity of charisms and perspectives”, while opening “spaces for the participation of women”, and committing the Church to “those suffering any type of exploitation”.
The Bishop of Limburg, Dr Georg Bätzing, who chairs the Roman Catholic German Bishops’ Conference, described the Pope as “a door-opener”, who had allowed topics such as homosexuality and clerical celibacy to be discussed frankly. He went on to say that “occasional disagreements” with him had “always been experienced as a fair struggle”, and said that he believed the Pope had initiated “an irreversible cultural change” throughout the RC Church.
The French bishops’ President, Archbishop Éric de Moulins-Beaufort, recalled Pope Francis’s three visits to his country, and said that he had “left his mark on pastoral practice” by working tirelessly “to make the Church more synodal and free of all clericalism”, and by giving Catholics “the taste of being missionary disciples”.
The Prior of Taizé, Brother Matthew, said on Monday: “From the very beginning of his pontificate, Pope Francis’s calls to reach out to the most vulnerable, to welcome migrants and refugees, to listen to the cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor, spoke deeply to us at Taizé. He gave value to those who thought they had none.”
In Spain, Archbishop Luis Argüello of Valladolid said that the 12-year pontificate had reflected “the social transformation that the world and the Church are undergoing”, and predicted that the next pope would follow the same path in “focusing on proximity with the poorest”.
In Italy, where church leaders were close to the Pope during his 38 days in hospital with double pneumonia, the chairman of the Bishops’ Conference, Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, said that his reformist stance had fuelled “some bad moods in those afraid and prefering to watch from afar”, but insisted that Francis had wished “to communicate God’s love for real humanity just as it is, without filters, without hypocrisy”.
In Eastern Europe, where some RC leaders criticised the Pope’s openness to LGBT and other groups, the Polish bishops’ chairman, Archbishop Tadeusz Wojda, praised Francis as a “pilgrim of hope” and “person of peace and reconciliation”.
The Primate of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, recalled serving alongside the then Archbishop Jorge Bergoglio in Argentina, and praised the Pope’s help for prisoners and deported children, as well as his “constant calls for a just peace and paternal closeness to the martyred Ukrainian people”.
Tributes have also come from RC survivors of clerical abuse, acknowledging his efforts to tackle the long-running crisis and recognise past mistakes, as well as from RC aid agencies, and recognising the Pope’s engagement in the struggle against poverty, hunger, and social injustice, as well as climate change and environmental degradation.
In a statement, Caritas Internationalis, which has organisations in 162 countries, said that Pope Francis had been “a beacon of compassion, justice, and unwavering commitment to the dignity of every human person”, and praised his “prophetic voice in defence of peace, social justice, and the care of our common home”.
It said that his leadership, notably through his encyclical letters Laudato Si’ and Fratelli Tutti, had inspired groups promoting “integral human development and solidarity”, and would “continue to guide and strengthen” those accompanying “communities affected by poverty, conflict and inequality”.
The Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar noted in a statement that the late Pope’s last public words on Easter Day had been “essentially an exhortation to ceasefire, peace, and hope”, while RC bishops in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, home to Africa’s largest Catholic population, recalled the Pope’s visit in February 2023, and said that he would remain “a model of living faith and hope for the Church”.
The Bishop of Garissa, in Kenya, the Rt Revd George Muthaka, praised the Pope for “championing” the continent on the world stage, and urged its inhabitants “not to allow anyone to look down” on them.
