A clear sky accompanied the last trip Pope Francis. St. Peter's Square and the Via della Conciliazone were as full as on great occasions to bid farewell to the Argentine Pontiff.
Maderno's façade, imposing like a stone monstrance, silently welcomed the restrained grief of the faithful, while the columns of Bernini's majestic colonnade opened their arms once again to envelop Rome and the world in a single embrace. It was not just a farewell: it was the living testimony of a pastor who knew how to touch the hearts of many.
In front of the altar of the tabernacle of the Square, the sober coffin of Francis, with no other ornament than the cross and the Gospel, rested humbly, as he had lived. At his feet, a solemn liturgy and a music capable of uniting heaven and earth, overpowering even the least believing of the political authorities who occupied the seats of honor. It was the universal language of beauty and eternity that only the Church knows how to preserve in its rites.
One of the most moving moments was after communion, when an impressive funeral rite from the Byzantine liturgy was sung in Greek. It was proof for Latin-rite Catholics that some of the most beautiful liturgies are those of our Eastern brethren. The chant, ancient as the faith itself, enveloped the square in an echo of eternity.
Pope Francis in Santa Maria Maggiore
The presence of thousands of priests concentrated in the first blocks was also a clear sign that the greatest thing a man can do is to celebrate the Eucharist. Just behind them, a group of more than a hundred deaf people and their sign interpreters recalled the tenderness with which Francis always wanted to care for the peripheries, even the invisible ones.
With the restrained solemnity of those who understand that they are attending an act that will be written in the pages of history, the funeral procession slowly moved the body of Francis inside the Basilica, to face his last journey, the six kilometers that unite the Vatican with the sober tomb he ordered to be built in Santa Maria Maggiore.
Today the Church is not only bury to a Pope, but to a brother who walked with us and was a loudspeaker of divine mercy.
