ROME – Pope Francis revised the funeral rites to be used when he dies, simplifying the rituals to emphasize his role only as a bishop and allowing the funeral to be held outside the Vatican in accordance with his wishes.

Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano on Wednesday published details of the updated liturgy that Francis approved on April 29, replacing the Bible. previous edition It was last published in 2000.

Francis turns 88 in December, and despite some health and mobility issues, he appears to be in good shape. On Wednesday, he presided over an enthusiastic general audience that included children spontaneously running onto the stage.

While popes often grapple with the rules governing the conclave that will elect their successors, a revision of papal funeral rites has seemingly become necessary following the death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI on December 31, 2022.

The Vatican was forced to hold a funeral for the first retired pope in 600 years, and a few months later Francis announced that he was working with Monsignor Diego Ravelli, the Vatican’s master of liturgy, to overhaul papal funeral rites to simplify them.

In an interview with Mexican Televisa broadcaster N+ in 2023, Francis also revealed that he had decided to be himself. buried in Santa Maria Maggiore Not in the caves under St. Peter’s Basilica, where most of the popes are buried, but in the basilica in Rome.

Ravelli said the new reform simplified funeral rites, including eliminating the requirement that the pope be placed in a high coffin in St. Peter’s Basilica for public view. Instead, he will be viewed in a simple coffin, and his funeral will no longer require the traditional three caskets made of cypress, lead and oak.

This simplification, Ravelli says, is meant to “emphasize even more that the body of the Roman Pope belongs to a shepherd and disciple of Jesus, and not to a powerful man of this world.”

Since his election in 2013, Francis has eschewed the ostentation usually associated with the papacy to emphasize his role as bishop of Rome and servant of the “church of the poor.” The Argentinian Jesuit lives in the Vatican hotel, not the Apostolic Palace, and travels in small Fords or Fiats, not luxury SUVs.

His desire to be buried in Santa Maria Maggiore reflects his reverence for the icon of the Virgin Mary found there, the Salus populi Romani (salvation of the Roman people).

After each trip, Francis goes to the basilica to pray in front of a Byzantine-style painting of Mary clad in a blue robe holding the infant Jesus, holding a jeweled golden book.

“This is my great commitment,” Francis told N+ when announcing future burial plans. “The place is already prepared.”

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