Pope wants to simplify papal funeral rites, be buried outside Vatican

Pope Francis attends the Holy Mass on the day of the feast of the Blessed Virgin of Guadalupe, at the Vatican, December 12, 2023. REUTERS

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis, who has shunned much of the Vatican’s pomp and privilege, has decided to vastly simplify the elaborate funeral rites for a pontiff by being the first one to be buried outside the Vatican in more than a century.

The pope, who turns 87 on Sunday, disclosed plans for his funeral in an interview with Mexico’s N+ television on Tuesday evening to mark the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

In the interview, taped before he presided at a Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica, Francis appeared to have recovered from a bout of bronchitis. He laughed often while discussing subjects such as his health, migration, his relationship with the late Pope Benedict XVI, and travel plans.

He said he was hoping to make three trips next year, to somewhere in Polynesia, Belgium, as well as his first visit to his native Argentina since his election in 2013.

Francis disclosed that he has been working with the Vatican’s master of ceremonies to simplify the elaborate, book-long funeral rites for a pope that have been used for his predecessors.

He also said that because of his devotion to Mary, the Mother of God, he has decided to be buried in Rome’s Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, where he traditionally goes to pray before and after each of his foreign trips.

For more than 100 years, popes have been buried in the grottoes under St. Peter’s Basilica.

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