VATICAN CITY — Tens of thousands of mourners paid last respects to Pope Francis at St Peter’s Basilica Wednesday, on the first of three days of lying in state for the head of the
Tens of thousands of mourners paid last respects to Pope Francis at St Peter’s Basilica Wednesday, on the first of three days of lying in state for the head of the world’s Catholics.
Pilgrims and tourists queued for hours to file past the open coffin of the Argentine pontiff, who died on Monday aged 88.
“We wanted to say thank you to one of the most humble popes,” said Portuguese medical student Francisca Antunes, 21, after leaving the Vatican basilica with a friend.
“It felt really good to be in there,” she told AFP.
By 7:45 pm (1745 GMT), almost nine hours after the doors of the basilica opened to the public, more than 19,400 people had paid their respects, the Vatican said.
Simonetta Marini, a 67-year-old from Rome, praised Francis’s human touch and defence of the world’s underdogs, which helped steer the Catholic Church towards a more inclusive, compassionate path.
“I came to say a last goodbye to a great man. He stood for the people,” Marini said.
Francis was an energetic reformer who took over as leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics in 2013.
His death, after a stroke and heart failure, came nearly a month after he left hospital where he spent five weeks being treated for pneumonia.
Dressed in his papal vestments — a red chasuble, white mitre and black shoes — and with a rosary laced between his fingers, the pope’s body has been laid out in a red-lined wooden coffin.
For three days, it will rest on a low bier before the Altar of the Confession underneath the basilica’s soaring dome painted by Michelangelo.
