VATICAN CITY — As world leaders took to their front row seats at the funeral of Pope Francis on Saturday, hundreds of thousands of Catholic pilgrims gathered in and around the pillared walls of St. Peter’s Square.
In a sunbaked Vatican City, huge crowds of devoted faithful stood for hours in a section beyond the neat rows of cardinals, who remained seated in their colorful robes and hats.
The laying to rest of the late pope was just one crescendo in what will be a weekslong series of events between the death of one pontiff and the naming of another that last happened two decades ago. It has drawn masses of Catholics from across the world to pay their respects and await the news of Francis' successor, giving the city-state a somber but friendly atmosphere.
“I felt a deep need to express my gratitude, my respect and my desire to strengthen the spiritual bond with the figure who, to me, represents the heart of the Catholic faith,” said Daniel Sanz, who had traveled from Spain.
“Being in the presence of the pope was a moment of profound emotion and reflection, an opportunity to renew my commitment to those values,” the teenager told NBC News.
Standing with the group of friends with whom he’d made the journey from Madrid, Sanz wore white rosary beads around his neck, explaining that “for me, Catholicism is a guide for life. It is a path that invites me to live with humility, responsibility and love for others.”
As hymns softly echoed around the square, Sunny Okuku, a local leader of a Nigerian ethnic Itsekiri community in England, spoke warmly of Francis.
“He wanted to be simple, he wanted to be humble, he wanted to be at the service of everybody. But most of all to those with the least in society,” said Okuku, clasping a commemorative Vatican newspaper dedicated to Francis and with two long feathers decoratively taped to his fedora.
“For me, he was a living saint,” he added.
Dressed in a floor-length black robe with a woolen coat slung over his shoulders, Cameroonian priest Derick Banin stood in silent prayer in front of the ornate dome of St. Peter’s Basilica.
“It’s a way of giving my last respects to him and thank him for the good work he has done for the church,” Banin said of Francis.
“As he goes, we ask that he keeps praying for us, as we pray for his soul as well.”
When day broke Saturday, large groups of teenagers sleeping in the cobbled square were unbothered by the faithful starting to trickle in ahead of the ceremony. Other visitors rested their weary heads on cafe tables as they waited to offer thanks to a leader many felt represented ordinary people and pray for whoever follows.
Francis was also a vocal supporter of efforts to find peace between Russia and Ukraine. While Saturday's ceremony was overshadowed by an impromptu meeting between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as they worked to thrash out their differences over Russia's ongoing invasion, signals of Francis' association with the conflict punctuated the crowd.
Framed by the imposing stone pillars of St. Peter’s Square, a woman waved a Ukrainian flag at the back of the audience.
There was plenty of other shades of yellow on display, too.
Draped in his richly embellished citrus-colored cloak, King Thomas, an interfaith preacher based between Germany and Thailand who has devoted his life to exploring Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity, said he came to offer his condolences to “a colleague who has gone to the next level in the sky.”
From Boy Scouts with colorful neckerchiefs, men dressed in traditional Polish folk attire to napping nuns carrying ceremonial crucifixes, the diverse congregation reflected the global span of the Catholic community.
The warm atmosphere continued into Sunday as crowds began to disperse from Vatican City. But residents were staying put, such as the elderly couple who shared a moment of affection on their Juliet balcony in the spring sunshine.
Sam Gregg reported from Vatican City and Max Butterworth reported from London.
