Catholic Pope Francis dies, aged 88 years

Pope Francis has died at the age of 88. Cardinal Kevin Ferrell, the Vatican camerlengo, said: “At 7.35 this morning, the bishop of Rome, Francis, returned to the home of the Father. His entire life was dedicated to the service of the Lord and of his church.″

Francis, who had chronic lung disease and had part of one lung removed as a young man, was admitted to Gemelli hospital in Rome on 14 February for a respiratory crisis that developed into double pneumonia. He spent 38 days there, the longest hospitalisation of his 12-year papacy.

In recent weeks, he left his home in Casa Santa Marta on several other occasions, including visiting prisoners at Rome’s Regina Coeli prison on Thursday and making a surprise visit to St Peter’s Basilica, wearing plain attire, a week before.

Loved by many Catholics for his humility, Francis simplified rites for papal funerals last year and previously said he had already planned his tomb in the basilica Santa Maria Maggiore in the Esquilino neighbourhood in Rome, where he went to pray before and after trips overseas. Popes are usually buried with much fanfare in the grottoes beneath St Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City.

Credit: Guardian UK

 

Amid intense mourning over the coming days and weeks, manoeuvring within the Vatican over who is to succeed Francis and become the 268th head of the Catholic church is certain to begin. Cardinals from around the world will head to Rome for a conclave, the secret, complex election ritual held in the Sistine Chapel and involving about 138 cardinals who are eligible to vote.

 

Some of the potential contenders mooted before Francis’s death were Matteo Zuppi, a progressive Italian cardinal, Pietro Parolin, who serves as the Vatican’s secretary of state, and Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, from the Philippines.