Francis: One Year On

Pilgrims filed past Pope Francis’ tomb in Rome this week as the Catholic Church marked the first anniversary of his death on April 21, 2025. (usccb.org) Francis died at 7:35 a.m. on Easter Monday at age 88 in his apartment at the Domus Sanctae Marthae in Vatican City, according to the Vatican medical statement published last year. The cause was listed as stroke, coma and irreversible cardiovascular collapse. (usccb.org) He was elected on March 13, 2013, and became the first pope from the Southern Hemisphere, the first Jesuit pope and the first non-European elected in nearly 1,300 years. He was born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on December 17, 1936. (usccb.org) The anniversary fell during the 2025-26 Jubilee period, when Rome has been receiving large flows of pilgrims for Holy Year events. Catholic outlets reported visitors praying at Francis’ tomb and diocesan remembrance liturgies tied to the date. (catholicsun.org) Francis spent much of his pontificate pushing the Church toward what he called the “peripheries,” with repeated emphasis on migrants, prisoners, the poor and people on the margins of church life. U.S. bishops said after his death that he would be remembered for outreach to “those on the margins of the Church and of society.” (usccb.org) That focus shaped both his symbolism and his travel. At his funeral in St. Peter’s Square on April 26, 2025, an estimated 200,000 people attended as cardinals praised him as “a pope among the people, with an open heart toward everyone.” (usccb.org) His successor, Pope Leo XIV, used the anniversary to tie Francis’ legacy to the current papacy. Speaking to reporters on the flight from Angola to Equatorial Guinea on April 21, Leo praised Francis’ preaching on mercy and his gestures of solidarity with poor people. (apnews.com) Vatican News said Leo was traveling the final leg of an April 13-23 trip to Algeria, Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea when he made the remarks. Leo said Francis had “gave so much to the Church” through “his life, his witness, his words, and his gestures.” (vaticannews.va) A year on, the commemoration centered less on reopening Francis’ internal church battles than on the image that defined him in public: a pope who made closeness a governing style. The lines at his tomb and Leo’s tribute from Africa both pointed back to that same record of mercy and solidarity. (apnews.com)