Delivered beneath the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica, in the presence of cardinals, world leaders, pilgrims, and saints invisible…
“Into Your hands, O Lord, we commend the soul of Your servant, Francis, our brother, Your priest, and Your pope…”
Today, beneath the sacred vaults of the Mother Church, where light breaks like grace through the celestial dome of Michelangelo’s vision, we gather not to mourn as those without hope, but to offer, with trembling hearts and tear-soaked faith, the last Eucharistic prayer for the soul of a man who bore the Cross of Christ for our times — Franciscus, Bishop of Rome, Pontifex Maximus, and pilgrim of mercy.
A stillness cloaks St. Peter’s Square — not the silence of death, but the reverent hush of eternity drawing close.
His Holiness Pope Francis, born Jorge Mario Bergoglio on December 17, 1936, has completed his earthly pilgrimage and crossed the threshold of the City of God. From the bustling barrios of Buenos Aires to the cathedra of Peter, his journey was not marked by conquest, but by compassion; not by grandeur, but by grace.
Tu es Petrus, et super hanc petram aedificabo Ecclesiam meam.
“You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church.”
When those sacred words were whispered anew in March of 2013, they found flesh in a man who refused the papal palace and chose instead the guesthouse. He was not elected to reign, but to remind — to remind a weary world that the Church is not a fortress, but a field hospital; that the Gospel is not a code of laws, but a song of redemption.
A Jesuit by formation and a Franciscan by spirit, Pope Francis harmonized two orders whose charisms once walked different roads. The intellect of Ignatius and the simplicity of Assisi met in his papacy like incense and flame. His every breath echoed the Jesuit maxim “contemplativus in actione” — a contemplative in action — and he stirred in the hearts of millions the joy of the Gospel.
His voice thundered in the halls of global diplomacy, yet it was also soft enough to comfort a child in Syria, a prisoner in Rome, a mother in Sudan. He was the Pope of the peripheries — who brought the light of Peter’s lamp to the alleyways of Calcutta and the favelas of Brazil. In his arms, the wounded Christ in the faces of the poor found rest. In his heart, the beat of Galilee’s fisherman echoed through Vatican marble.
He opened the Church’s arms to the divorced and broken, to refugees and undocumented migrants, to the LGBTQ faithful and to those long estranged by doctrine or shame. He did not alter truth, but widened the door. And in doing so, he reminded us all that mercy is the deepest doctrine of God.
In his encyclicals — Evangelii Gaudium, Laudato Si’, and Fratelli Tutti — he became a prophetic voice for the care of creation, the dignity of the poor, and the fraternity of all peoples. He dared to place the wounded earth on the altar beside the Eucharist. He shattered the illusion of distance between the sacred and the secular, proving that the cry of the Amazonian forest and the sob of the migrant child were themselves psalms of the suffering Christ.
Let history record that Pope Francis refused the pomp of imperial Rome, yet he wielded the authority of the Apostles. He bent the knee to the broken, washed the feet of women, Muslims, prisoners, and the forgotten. His life was a living Credo. He wept with the weeping. He rejoiced with the simple. He lifted his eyes, not to power, but to the crucified Savior whose wounds he bore invisibly.
And yet, even as he carried the weight of Peter’s keys, he never abandoned the sacred loneliness of the soul before God. Beneath the white papal zucchetto was a heart wrapped in prayer, forged by nights of silence, rosaries whispered before the tabernacle, and the long sighs of a man who bore the agony of a world not yet reconciled.
He was criticized, even opposed, and sometimes misunderstood. But like the prophets of old, he spoke not for popularity, but for conversion. His eyes were always turned toward the Cross — not as an ornament, but as a compass. Through health struggles, moments of geopolitical turmoil, and the aching divisions within the Body of Christ, Francis stood firm — not as a warrior, but as a wounded healer.
And now — this morning, as the eternal dawn kissed the cupola of this basilica, the Fisherman of the Slums was called home.
The pallium has been laid down. The papal ring removed. The shoes of the fisherman — worn from long walks among the poor — are now at rest. But his legacy marches forward, incarnate in every believer who dares to love without condition, to serve without seeking, to live with humility, and to embrace the stranger as Christ.
O Church of Christ, behold your father, now at peace. Let the incense rise. Let the bells sing out. Let the Requiem be sung with grandeur and gratitude.
May the choirs of angels come to greet him.
May the saints of the Americas, of Africa, of Asia, of Assisi and Loyola, rise in solemn welcome.
May he behold the face of Mary, whose rosary he carried like a sword of light.
May the Crucified Lord, whom he loved so tenderly in the poor, now embrace him in glory.
We say not farewell, but “Arrivederci, Papa Francesco” — until we meet again in the place where no tears shall fall, where the lamb lies with the lion, and where justice and peace shall kiss.
“Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May he rest in peace. Amen.”
By Jide Adesina
Editor-In-Chief
