What it’s like in the church Pope Francis chose as his final resting place

ROME — Pope Francis will be the first pontiff in more than a century to be buried outside the Vatican Grottoes. After his funeral on Saturday, he will be laid to rest in the Basilica of St. Mary Major, which stands sentinel across the city in the Esquilino district.

The decision by Pope Francis to do this, Cardinal Rolandas Makrickas told NPR, was the result of “divine intervention.”

Legend has it that this fourth century church was built after the Virgin Mary appeared in a dream to an aristocrat, Giovanni, and to Pope Liberius, requesting a house of worship in her honor.

Pope Francis told Mackrikas, who is the coadjutor archpriest of the Basilica of St. Mary Major, that the Virgin Mary appeared before him, requesting that he be laid to rest in her church.

“The intervention was, I would say, divine from Mary directly,” Makrickas said. Francis recounted the story of the Virgin Mary’s appearance before him during a meeting at his residence in which the Pope asked Makrickas to make the necessary arrangements for his tomb at the basilica. “He told me: ‘I am very I am so happy that Mary didn’t forget me.’ “

Throughout his papacy, Pope Francis visited St. Mary Major basilica — with its colonnades of cipollino marble and intricate statues — 126 times. He went there principally to pray to the Salus Populi Romani, health or protectress of the Roman people in Latin, a painting on cedar wood that shows the Virgin Mary holding baby Jesus. This icon was brought to Rome from the East in the fifth century, when Mary was declared the Mother of God at the Council of Ephesus in 431. Tradition holds that it was painted by St. Luke the Evangelist, whose written narratives became the gospel that bears his name and the book of Acts in the New Testament.

The Virgin Mary icon seemed to become almost an ally for Francis in his papacy. He visited her on his first day as pope in 2013, and would pray to her before and after every trip out of Rome. It was the first place he went after he was discharged from Gemelli hospital in March to convalesce from double pneumonia at the Vatican. And he returned to pray there just days before he died on Easter Monday.

The Salus Populi Romani is said to have saved Rome from a plague in the year 590, when Pope Gregory the Great organized a procession with her through the city streets.

And during the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, Pope Francis had her brought to St. Peter’s Basilica, where he prayed in the rain, standing almost alone in an empty St. Peter’s Square.

“We know that you can take care of us,” Francis said during his prayers.

Seven other popes are buried at St. Mary Major. “But the vast majority of these popes were buried here during the 120 plus years it took to build St. Peter’s Basilica,” says Agnes Crawford, a longtime guide in Rome. “So for a sort of logistical reason, rather than necessary preference.”

In the days leading up to Francis’ funeral, the basilica has been alive with visitors curious to see the church where he will be buried. The chapel that houses the Salus Populi Romani was crowded with faithful in prayer. Their words and song rang out into the high ceilinged basilica.

And beside the chapel was the nave where Francis will be buried. At the time NPR visited this week, it was obscured by chipboard panels as works continued on Francis’ burial vault. The Vatican later released a photo showing the tomb ready to receive him after the funeral. On the back wall of the nave hangs a replica of Francis’ pectoral cross. And on the ground is a simple marble stone containing a single word engraved: Franciscus.

The simplicity of his resting place follows the express request made by Francis in his will. Pope Francis shunned much of the pomp and frills of papacy — choosing simpler dress, eschewing chauffeurs or, if he did have to be driven, appearing in a modest Fiat car (when not riding in the popemobile).

Popes are traditionally buried inside three nested coffins: one of cypress wood, one of elm and one of lead. Francis has chosen a single wooden casket lined with zinc.

“The message we took from Francis’ simplicity is that he was trying to make people understand that we are all the same,” says Giuseppe Cipolla, who had come to visit St. Mary Major with his wife and two children. “And that this planet is for everyone — there shouldn’t be the privileged and the poor.”

Francis will be the first pope in more than 350 years to be buried at the Basilica of St. Mary Major. (The last one was Clement IX.)

For 16 centuries, this basilica has stood sentinel. Today, the Esquilino district where it is housed has a large immigrant population and the city’s main train station. Historically however,  the area — the Esquiline Hill — was one of the seven ancient hills on which Rome was founded.

The foundational story is a miraculous tale. After the Virgin Mary appeared to the aristocrat Giovanni, and to Pope Liberius in a dream asking for a church in her honor, she told them they should build it in a location that would be miraculously revealed. Then, it snowed on this hill in Rome, on Aug. 5 — the height of summer.