On Saturday 26 April, the Church bid farewell to Pope Francis in a moving Funeral Mass celebrated in Saint Peter’s Square, the very place where the late pontiff had led so many historic liturgies and joyful gatherings over the past twelve years.
Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Dean of the College of Cardinals, delivered the homily before a sea of mourners, including global dignitaries and pilgrims, who came to honour the first pope from the Americas. “We are gathered with sad hearts in prayer around his mortal remains,” the cardinal began, “yet, we are sustained by the certainty of faith… in a life of happiness that will know no end.”
Cardinal Re continued, “On behalf of the College of Cardinals, I cordially thank all of you for your presence. With deep emotion, I extend respectful greetings and heartfelt thanks to the Heads of State, Heads of Government and Official Delegations who have come from many countries to express their affection, veneration and esteem for our late Holy Father.
“The outpouring of affection that we have witnessed in recent days following his passing from this earth into eternity tells us how much the profound pontificate of Pope Francis touched minds and hearts.”
Recalling Pope Francis’s final public appearance – his Urbi at Orbi Easter Sunday blessing – Cardinal Re noted how the Holy Father “chose to follow this path of self-giving until the last day of his earthly life.”
Cardinal Re continued, “With our prayers, we now entrust the soul of our beloved Pontiff to God, that he may grant him eternal happiness in the bright and glorious gaze of his immense love.”
Here at home, Pope Francis was also remembered in Requiem Masses celebrated across the island Ireland. Church bells tolled from Armagh to Dublin to Cork as clergy and members of the faithful gathered in cathedrals, basilicas and churches.
In Armagh, Archbishop Eamon Martin recalled Pope Francis’s humble first greeting to the pilgrims assembled in Saint Peter’s Square in 2013: “Buonasera.” In Ennis, Bishop Fintan Monahan described him as “a disrupter and reformer.” And in Dublin, Bishop Paul Dempsey praised the Pope’s compassion, saying, “He believed in a Church that walked with the wounded.”
Now laid to rest in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome under the simple inscription Franciscus, the world remembers not just the Pope, but the man who taught us – as Bishop Dempsey reminded us – “not only how to live, but also how to die.”
To read Cardinal Re’s homily please click HERE
ENDS
