MANILA, Philippines — As the solemn Requiem Mass for Pope Francis ended on Saturday, April 26, thousands of people stood in ovation to express their “gratitude for the man who gave his all.”
Fr. Edmel Raagas, a Filipino priest based in Rome, shared a video of the crowd breaking into a prolonged applause as the coffin of the late pope was lifted “one last time” outside St. Peter’s Basilica, where he first greeted the world as pope in 2013.
He said the moment the coffin was lifted by the pallbearers for the thousands of people to see was the most moving part of the ceremony, which was concluded by the interment of Pope Francis’s remains at the Basilica of St. Mary Major.
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The basilica was often visited by the pope throughout his 12-year pontificate, which ended after his death on Monday, April 21, due to a stroke that led to a coma and “irreversible” heart failure.
For Raagas, the lifting of the coffin was like Pope Francis’ “final act as a priest faithful to God till the very end.” This was met by almost endless cheers from the crowd, an expression of “gratitude for the man who gave his all,” Raagas said.
Pallbearers carry the coffin of late Pope Francis at the end of the mass of funeral ceremony in St Peter’s Square, at the Vatican, on April 26, 2025. Agence France-Presse
Pope Francis, or Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the first from Latin America to be elected in a conclave, was the 266th successor to St. Peter, after Pope Benedict XVI, who resigned in 2013 because of health reasons.