DILI, 23 April 2025 (TATOLI) – Three Timorese leaders will be among the many world leaders to attend Pope Francis’ funeral, which has been scheduled for Saturday at 10 a.m. in Saint Peter’s Square.
President Ramos Horta, who is currently on a state visit to Bulgaria and the UK, has been confirmed to represent Timor-Leste at the funeral. Meanwhile, Dom Virgílio do Carmo da Silva, SDB, the Cardinal of Timor-Leste, along with Timor-Leste’s Foreign Minister, Bendito Freitas, will also attend the funeral.
The funeral liturgy will be presided over by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Dean of the College of Cardinals, the Vatican said.
The Holy See Press Office has announced that the funeral Mass of the Pope will be held, in accordance with the provisions of the “The Order of Funerals for Roman Pontiffs” known as the Ordo Exsequiarum Romani Pontificis.
“The Eucharistic celebration will conclude with the Ultima commendatio and the Valedictio, marking the beginning of the Novemdiales, or nine days of mourning and Masses for the repose of Pope Francis’ soul,” Holy See Press Office said in a statement. “The late Pope’s body will then be taken into St. Peter’s Basilica and then to the Basilica of St. Mary Major for entombment.”
In November 2024, Pope Francis approved the Ordo Exsequiarum Romani Pontificis, a liturgical book containing the rites preceding and during the funerary liturgy for a Bishop of Rome. With the introduction of several new elements for papal funerals, the ascertainment of death will no longer take place in the room of the deceased but in the chapel, and his mortal remains will be placed immediately inside the coffin. So the faithful will be able to venerate the Pope’s body inside the open coffin.
Pope Francis died of a stroke and irreversible heart failure at the Vatican on Monday, April 21, 2025, at 7:35 a.m. local time in Rome, at the age of 88.
Pope Francis was the first pontiff to visit Timor-Leste since it gained independence from Indonesia in 2002. The first pope to visit the island was St. John Paul II, who traveled to the country on October 12, 1989, during the Indonesian occupation.
During his three-day stay in the country from September 9 to 11, 2024, Pope Francis met with some of the country’s national and religious leaders, visited vulnerable groups, and spoke to massive crowds of the faithful in Dili. The late Pope left a message of hope, unity, and commitment to peace, emphasizing the importance of youth, and the protection of the cultural and spiritual values of the Timorese people.
TATOLI
