Pope Francis passed away yesterday after 12 years as the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, triggering an outpouring of mourning across the globe.
Vatican correspondent for EWTN Media Paola Arriaza told Newstalk Breakfast that the Pope died following a cerebral stroke which caused a coma and then irreversible cardiac arrest.
“Let's remember that this was a patient suffering from acute respiratory failure, arterial hypertension, type 2 diabetes,” she said.
“These are serious health issues that Pope Francis had after his double pneumonia.
“The latest news is also that he signed a will in 2022, and I wanted to read you one of the beautiful lines on his will.
“He said that he wants his tomb to be ‘simple, without particular decoration and with the only inscription: Franciscus’.”
Cardinal Kevin Farrell during the Rite of the Constatation of the Death of the Pontiff at the Chapel of Santa Marta .Photograph by VATICAN MEDIA /Catholic Press Photo. 2025/4/21Ms Arriaza said the Pope had stated that he wanted to be buried in the papal Basilica of St. Mary Major.
He will likely lie in repose from Wednesday until Saturday, when the Vatican has announced his funeral will take place.
“There’s a brief period of nine days for mourning, and there are two very important cardinals at this time,” she said.
“One is the Camerlengo, which is Irish, and then we have the Dean of the School of Cardinals, is Giovanni Battista Re.
“He's the one who's going to celebrate the funeral, the Dean, and he's the one who has just announced the General Congregations.
“Those are preliminary meetings where he invites cardinals from different parts of the world; from Mongolia, from Sudan, even from my country of El Salvador, to come to Rome.”
Electoral campaign
According to Ms Arriaza, the General Congregations resemble an electoral campaign.
“They start talking about what the Church needs now,” she said.
“This is exactly the moment when in 2013 Bergoglio [Pope Francis] started talking about the peripheries, which as you know has been one of his main discourses during his pontificate.
“So, this is a very important moment and this will start today.”
An estimated 1.4 billion Catholics across the world will mourn Francis' passing.
Main image: Altar next to an open book of condolences for the death of Pope Francis I, next to a portrait of the Pope and a wreath of flowers, at the Apostolic Nunciature, April 22, 2025, in Madrid (Spain). Image: Antonio Gutierrez / Europa Press. 22 April 2025
