On Saturday President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump attended Pope Francis funeral in Saint Peter’s Square during a historic Solemn Requiem Mass.
The Holy Father, spiritual leader to 1.39 billion Catholics worldwide, passed away Monday at age 88 after suffering a stroke, followed by coma and irreversible heart failure, according to the Vatican’s health officials.
The pope’s death came just hours after he met privately with Vice President JD Vance, a practicing Catholic, and delivered a final Easter blessing to a massive crowd of 50,000 in Saint Peter’s Square — a fitting capstone to his decades of public ministry.
Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, dean of the College of Cardinals, presided over the funeral Mass, which saw an extraordinary gathering of 250 cardinals, over 750 bishops and priests, and throngs of consecrated religious members.
US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump arrived at the Vatican and went to the foot of the coffin of Pope Francis to pay their respects to the beloved late Pope. pic.twitter.com/NvKMOwbVfn
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Catholics and non-Catholics alike from every corner of the world gathered, demonstrating Pope Francis’s enduring call for a Church