Today's Edition
Rome (AFP)
Hundreds of thousands of mourners joined world leaders, including US President Donald Trump, to bid farewell Saturday to Pope Francis, a champion of the poor who strived to forge a more compassionate Catholic church.
The Vatican said 400,000 people packed St Peter's Square and lined the streets of Rome for the funeral of the first Latin American leader of the world's 1.4 billion Catholics.
ALSO WATCH: World bids farewell in funeral service for Pope
After a solemn funeral, the Argentine pontiff's plain wooden coffin -- a testament to a life of humility -- was driven slowly to Rome's Santa Maria Maggiore church, where he was interred in a private ceremony.
Cardinals marked his coffin with red wax seals before it was lowered into a tomb set inside an alcove, according to images released by the Vatican.
Read more: https://t.co/vbQI4DsBP3 #AletihadNewsCenter #Vatican #popefrancisfuneral #PopeFrancis #Pope #Rome #Italy pic.twitter.com/OQjDLKMRW6
— Aletihad English (@AletihadEn) April 26, 2025
Fourteen white-gloved pallbearers carried the coffin into the church, as children placed baskets of flowers at the altar and a choir sang prayers.
The marble tomb is inscribed with just one word: "Franciscus", his papal name in Latin.
Trump was among more than 50 heads of state at the funeral. He met several world leaders in a corner of the St Peter's basilica before, notably Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, in their first face-to-face meeting since their Oval Office clash in February.
'An open heart'
Francis, who died on Monday aged 88, was "a pope among the people, with an open heart", who strove for a more compassionate, open-minded Catholic Church, said Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re who led the service.
There was applause from the masses gathered under bright blue skies as he hailed the pope's "conviction that the Church is a home for all, a home with its doors always open".
Francis sought to steer the Church into a more inclusive direction during his 12-year-long papacy, and his death prompted a global outpouring of emotion.
Italian and Vatican authorities mounted a major security operation for the ceremony, with fighter jets on standby and snipers positioned on roofs surrounding the tiny city state.
Red-robed cardinals and purple-hatted bishops sat on one side of the altar in St Peter's Square during the funeral, with world dignitaries sitting opposite.
In front of the altar lay the pope's simple cypress coffin, inlaid with a pale cross.
'Bridges not walls'
The funeral set off nine days of official Vatican mourning for Francis, who took over following the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI in 2013.
After the mourning, cardinals aged under 80 will elect a new pope from among their number.
Many of Francis's reforms angered traditionalists, while his criticism of injustices, from the treatment of migrants to the damage wrought by global warming, riled many world leaders.
Yet the former archbishop of Buenos Aires's compassion and charisma earned him global affection and respect.
"His gestures and exhortations in favour of refugees and displaced persons are countless," Battista Re said.
In the homily, Battista Re highlighted Francis's incessant calls for peace, and said he had urged "reason and honest negotiation" in efforts to end conflicts raging around the world.
"'Build bridges, not walls' was an exhortation he repeated many times," the cardinal said.
Trump's predecessor, Joe Biden also attended the funeral, alongside UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, Germany's Olaf Scholz, Italy's Giorgia Meloni, and Lebanon's Joseph Aoun.
Francis died of a stroke and heart failure less than a month after he left the hospital where he had battled pneumonia for five weeks.
His last public act, the day before his death, was an Easter Sunday blessing to the world, ending his papacy as he had begun it -- with an appeal to protect the "vulnerable, the marginalised and migrants".
The Jesuit chose to be named after Saint Francis of Assisi, saying he wanted "a poor Church for the poor", and lived at a Vatican guesthouse rather than the papal palace.
Catholics around the world held events to watch the proceedings live, including in Buenos Aires, where Francis was born as Jorge Bergoglio in the poor neighbourhood of Flores in 1936.
