The funeral ceremony of Pope Francis began today at 1:30 pm (IST) at the majestic Baroque square outside St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican City. The popular pontiff will be laid to rest in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome.
World leaders, including India's President Droupadi Murmu and former President of the United States Donald Trump, have all arrived to honor the powerful Catholic leader with their last respects.
The ceremony attracted close to 200,000 mourners, as Italian and Vatican security agencies coordinated a large-scale operation to provide security. The somber event also sets the stage for nine days of official mourning inside the Vatican to pay tribute to Pope Francis, who took the papacy after Pope Benedict XVI resigned in 2013.
Pope Francis died on April 21 at the age of 88, following a stroke, weeks after recovering from a bad bout of double pneumonia. Incredibly, only 20 hours before his death, he delivered his last public appearance on Easter Sunday, spreading a message of hope, peace, and rebirth — a bittersweet goodbye to a world he served with humility and dignity.
