Huge crowds continued to queue
outside Saint Peter's Basilica on Thursday to pay homage to Pope
Francis as his body lies in state for the second day after tens
of thousands did so on Wednesday.
Some 48,600 people visited between the opening of the cathedral
to the public at 11:00 on Wednesday and 8:30 on Thursday after
queuing for hours, Vatican media said.
The basilica had been scheduled to close at midnight but the
queues to visit the remains of the late pontiff, who died aged
88 on Monday after 12 years at the helm of the Catholic Church,
were so long that the Vatican kept it open until 5:30 on
Thursday, before reopening it two hours later.
Around 13,000 people visited between midnight and 5.30.
Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni was among the officials to pay
their respects on Wednesday.
The body will also lie in State on Friday before Saturday's
funeral in Saint Peter's Square, which world leaders including
US President Donald Trump are set to attend, along with over
200,000 mourners.
Dressed in a red robe with a white mitre on his head and a
rosary in his hands, the Argentine pope's body is in an open
coffin laid in front of the Altar of Confession on a small,
slightly inclined platform on a carpet on the ground and not on
a catafalque, in a break with the past in respect of the late
pope's wishes.
A rite will be held at 20:00 on Friday in Saint Peter's Basilica
for the closing of Francis's coffin presided over by Kevin
Joseph Farrell, Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church.
Francis's remains will be laid to rest in Rome's Saint Mary
Major Basilica on Saturday after his funeral.
The late pontiff would always go to Saint Mary Major to pray
before and after every apostolic journey he went on and he asked
to buried there, not in St Peter's like most other popes, in his
testament.
"I ask that my tomb be prepared in the burial niche in the side
aisle between the Pauline Chapel (Chapel of the Salus Populi
Romani) and the Sforza Chapel of the Basilica," the testament
read.
"The tomb should be in the ground; simple, without particular
ornamentation, bearing only the inscription: Franciscus".
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