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LAST UPDATE | 26 Apr
RIGHT FROM THE moment he became leader of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis broke with tradition.
And in typical fashion, Francis broke with tradition right at the end, with transgender people and prisoners being among the small group who gave Francis his final farewell.
While his predecessor Benedict XVI often had a fondness for the pageantry of the office, wearing red papal shoes that people erroneously said were Prada, Francis took a different path.
“The red shoes? No, I have orthopaedic shoes, I’m rather flat-footed,” said Francis when he was in the “Room of Tears” getting ready for his first public appearance as the new pontiff.
He also turned down a “beautiful golden cross” and kept the nickel silver one he had been carrying for some 20 years.
Francis then took one look at the Apostolic Palace and decided to break with tradition once more, opting to reside instead in the Santa Marta apartments on the edge of Vatican City, a modest hotel-like building constructed for visiting clergy during the reign of Pope John Paul II.
And so it was that even to the grave, Francis broke with tradition, becoming the first pope since Pope Leo XII in 1903 to be buried outside the Vatican.
And so it was that his final resting place was Santa Maria Maggiore, a basilica close to his heart.
It’s in a rather unfashionable area of Rome – on a taxi journey to the basilica on the night before Francis’ funeral, a taxi driver warned to be especially wary of pickpockets.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons Francis chose to be buried here and indeed a group of poor and needy people were on hand to give Francis his final send off.
According to Vatican News, the group included poor people, homeless, prisoners, migrants and transgender individuals, who paid their last tribute and expressed their gratitude to Francis.
The Vatican said that for many of them, he was like a “father.”
Vatican News said it was these 40 or so people, each holding white roses, were the last to bid farewell to the Francis, just before his burial in Santa Maria Maggiore.
“The poor hold a privileged place in God’s heart,” and therefore “also in the heart and teachings of the Holy Father, who chose the name Francis so as never to forget them,” said the Vatican.
While this final send-off was not televised, a source said they were “seated in a position of authority”.
The idea for this final encounter came from an exchange between Bishop Diego Ravelli, the Master of Pontifical Liturgical Celebrations, and Bishop Benoni Ambarus, a Vatican delegate for charitable initiatives.
Speaking to Vatican News, Ambarus said this came from a desire to “strengthen the presence of the poor at the funeral or in some other meaningful way.”
He said they wanted to include a “representation of various categories of vulnerable people — the poor, the homeless, migrants, prisoners or former prisoners, or poor families”.
Ambarus said most of the group had met Francis at least once, and added that those represented included a “small group of transgender individuals I know, who live with a community of nuns and whom we support”.
To mark the 2023 World Day of the Poor, Francis welcomed a group of transgender women, with whom he had formed an ongoing relationship, to a luncheon at the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall.
Speaking yesterday, Ambarus said the final list of attendees at had not yet been confirmed, especially regarding the prisoners from Rome’s Rebibbia prison, who were still awaiting authorisation.
In his final days, Francis visited Rome’s Regina Coeli prison on Holy Thursday, though he was not able to wash the prisoner’s feet as he usually would due to illness.
Meanwhile, the Santa Maria Maggiore also holds a special place in Francis’s heart because it houses the Salus Populi Romani icon.
Before and after every foreign journey, he would pray before the Salus Populi Romani icon.
He also made an unscheduled stop on his way home to the Vatican from hospital to pray before the icon.
The icon depicts a half-figure of Our Lady with the Child Jesus in her arms.
When Francis appeared from the balcony of the Gemelli hospital in Rome after his 38-day hospitalisation, one of the few words he said was: “I see this woman with the yellow flowers. Brava.”
Francis was able to get a hold of these flowers and he placed them before the icon.
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