Pope Francis laid to rest after funeral mass draws crowds to St Peter’s Square
Event date: 2025-04-26
Pope Francis was buried privately on Saturday after a funeral mass in St Peter’s Square that drew thousands of mourners to Vatican City and brought together dozens of world leaders, royals and pilgrims from around the globe.
The ABC report in the packet says the funeral took place in St Peter’s Square before the coffin was taken to Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore for burial. It also says the pope died on Monday at the age of 88 and that tens of thousands had already filed past his open coffin in St Peter’s Basilica earlier in the week.
The scale of the farewell was significant even by Vatican standards. The report describes crowds in the square and along the procession route through Rome, with people lining the streets as the coffin moved toward its final resting place. Among the mourners were international leaders and ordinary Catholics who had travelled to Rome to take part in the ceremony.
The burial location was especially notable. Pope Francis became the first pope in a century to be buried outside the Vatican, choosing Santa Maria Maggiore rather than the traditional papal burial site. The source says that the choice would make his grave more accessible to devotees and reflected his own wish for people to be able to visit him more easily.
The funeral itself also reflected themes that defined his papacy. Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re used his homily to recall Francis’s repeated calls for peace, and the ABC report says the ceremony was followed by a nine-day mourning period before the cardinals enter conclave. That means the church’s formal transition to a new pope could not begin immediately after the burial.
The funeral included a number of symbolic gestures. The coffin’s arrival at Santa Maria Maggiore was greeted by migrants, prisoners, homeless people and transgender people holding white roses, a detail the report linked to Francis’s concern for the marginalised. The article also notes that a handful of Australians travelling for the church’s jubilee celebrations had been in St Peter’s Square on Easter Sunday and returned for the funeral, describing the moment as emotional and surreal.
Although the Vatican event was steeped in ritual, the broader story is one of global public mourning and an imminent institutional transition. The packet shows a church preparing to move from farewell to election, with the funeral mass closing one chapter and the conclave opening another.
For NeoTechNews purposes, the most defensible account is straightforward: Pope Francis’s funeral took place on 26 April 2025, the mass was held in St Peter’s Square, and he was buried privately at Santa Maria Maggiore after a large public farewell.
Claim-to-source map - Pope Francis’s funeral mass was held in St Peter’s Square: source 4749 - He was buried privately at Santa Maria Maggiore: source 4749 - Thousands attended and dozens of world leaders were present: source 4749 - Francis was 88 and died earlier that week: source 4749 - He was the first pope buried outside the Vatican in 100 years: source 4749
