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Pope Francis was known as “a pope among the people” during a funeral mass in Place Saint-Pierre in Rome to which the leaders attended by American president Donald Trump and the president of Ukraine Volodyr Zelenskyy.
Trump and Zelenskyy spoke for a few minutes before the funeral start, according to a senior Ukrainian official. It was the first time they saw each other in person since their deadly public row in the oval office in February. The pair met in private and had a “very productive discussion”, told Reuters a White House official.
Applause broke out when Zelenskyy, dressed in the black military style costume which has become its basic food in wartime, entered the Place St Peter’s.
Dozens of world leaders attended mass, notably French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, Argentina right -wing president Javier Milei and Brazil’s leftist president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
In a tribute to the late pontiff, the Italian cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, 91, recalled Francis’s commitment to the migrants, the refugees and the marginalized, and how he “really shared the anxieties, the sufferings and the hopes of this period of globalization”.
Francis was guided by “the conviction that the church is a house for all, a house with its doors always open,” said Re, recalling the 47 trips abroad of the deceased Pope, including a trip to 2021 in Iraq and a visit to the American-Mexican border, where he made a mass.
“He often used the image of the church as a country hospital after a battle, in which many were injured; a church determined to take care of the problems of people … A church capable of leaning on each person, whatever their beliefs or their conditions, and heal their wounds,” said the cardinal.
The Royals, including British Prince William and the Monarques in Spain, Sweden and Denmark, attended mass, as well as heads of international institutions such as the UN and the European Commission. Former American president Joe Biden was also present.
The Holy See estimates that around 200,000 people gathered on Saint-Pierre square for the funeral mass, including 220 cardinals and around 750 bishops and priests.
The pontiff will be buried later on Saturday in Santa Maria Maggiore, his favorite church in Rome, after a 5.5 km funeral procession across the city, passing some of its most famous monuments, including the Colosseum. He will be the first pope for over a century to be buried in front of the walls of the city of the Vatican.
While the burial will be a private ceremony, the church will open shortly after so that the mourning people can pay tribute to the deceased pope, who will be under a tombstone in marble inscribed “Franciscus”.
According to the Vatican.
Francis last year simplified the rites of papal death. Archbishop Diego Ravelli, master of apostolic ceremonies, said at the time that changes were intended to emphasize that “the funeral of the Roman pontiff is that of a pastor and a disciple of Christ, not a powerful person of this world”.
During his 12 years on the Papal throne, Francis sought to return the Catholic Church – which has 1.4 billion disciples in the world – more compatiating and accessible, while solving contemporary problems such as climate change.
His death this week at the age of 88 caused a wave of grieving admirers but also the dissent of criticism, including influential members of the Mag of Trump.
The burial marks the start of an official period of mourning of nine days, after which up to 135 eligible cardinals under 80 years old will be locked in the Vatican for a conclave to select the new Pope.
The first favorites include Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State of the deceased Pope, Cardinal Luis Tagle of the Philippines and Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo BesUngu.
The Funeral Homélème de Re will be interpreted by many Catholics as a spiritual direction to cardinal voters on the qualities they should seek in a new Pope.
Additional Giuliana Ricozzi reports in Rome and Christopher Miller in Kyiv
