Faithful begin to pay their respects to Pope Francis (photos)

Following the transfer of Pope Francis' remains to St. Peter's Basilica, all the faithful who wish to do so can now pray before the deceased pontiff. The basilica will be open till midnight in these days, to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of faithful who are expected to pass before the coffin for a moment of prayer.

The closing ceremony for Pope Francis' coffin will take place on Friday, April 25, 2025, at 8 p.m., the day before his funeral scheduled for Saturday, the Vatican's Office for Liturgical Celebrations announced on April 23. The rite will be presided over in St. Peter's Basilica by Cardinal Camerlengo Kevin Farrell, the Vatican administrator during the Apostolic See's holiday.

I.MEDIA visited the first groups of pilgrims crowding at the entrance to St. Peter's Basilica, many of whom, just minutes earlier, had witnessed the moving passage of the Pope's coffin in the square before it entered the building.

Among the small crowd that arrived at 8 a.m., Father Lucca came from Milan with 47 young people from his parish. "We already had the Jubilee of Adolescents on the agenda," he explains. "When we arrived on Monday, we learned of the Pope's death; it saddened us greatly and shook us," confides this young priest in his 30s. The group chose to follow the translation and come to the basilica to venerate the remains of the deceased Pope as soon as the doors opened at 11 a.m. "Now," adds the chaplain, "our pilgrimage becomes an opportunity to ask the Lord for the gift of a new pontiff for the Church."

Father Dieudonné, a priest from the Diocese of Boma in the Democratic Republic of Congo, came to express his gratitude for the "message of hope" left by the Pope during his visit to his country in 2023.

"He left powerful messages, he shouted loud and clear to all those people who are plundering Congo -- to withdraw their hands, to let our country move forward," recalls this priest now studying in Italy.

"He did what he had to do, he proclaimed the message of Christ, which is a message of peace. But it was like a seed sown in the earth. I could say that today it has not yet borne fruit, because with the hardening of hearts, the war has taken on dimensions that could not have been expected," he regrets.

The shock of the pontiff's passing, he says, presents an opportunity to give new meaning to his calls for peace. "His death allows us to awaken our consciences, it allows the whole world to pay attention to our situation. And now, a great responsibility falls on the Congolese people, on all those who covet Congo's riches, to finally change things," he hopes.