Pope Francis’ Last Words Revealed as Vatican Shares New Details of His Final Hours: ‘Tired but Content’ – Yahoo News Canada
2025-04-22T15:10:09Z
“It all happened quickly,” the church said in a new statement
The Vatican is sharing new details about Pope Francis’ final hours before he died of a stroke early on Monday, April 21.
Among his final words in the day before dying, the church said, were “thank you.”
That’s what Francis, 88, told his longtime health aide, Massimiliano Strappetti, a nurse whom the pope has said “once saved his life by suggesting colon surgery,” according to the Vatican’s press office.
Strappetti also offered his support as Francis decided to make a surprise appearance in the so-called popemobile, touring among tens of thousands of worshippers outside St. Peter’s Basilica for Easter Sunday, where he also delivered an annual blessing.
Beforehand, the Vatican said, Francis had asked Strappetti: “Do you think I can manage it?”
Later, he told his aide, “Thank you for bringing me back to the Square.” The Vatican said he was “tired but content.”
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Pope Francis in December 2024. Antonio Masiello/Getty
Afterward, Francis — who also made time earlier on Sunday to meet with Vice President J.D. Vance, despite their differences — “rested on Sunday afternoon and had a quiet dinner,” the Vatican said.
His health deteriorated quickly on Monday morning, according to the church, with “the first signs of the sudden illness” appearing about 5:30 a.m. local time.
“Around an hour later, after making a gesture of farewell with his hand to Mr. Strappetti, lying in bed in his second-floor apartment at the Casa Santa Marta, the Pope fell into a coma,” the Vatican said.
“According to those who were with him in his final moments, he did not suffer. It all happened quickly,” the church’s statement continued, describing Francis’ death as “discreet … almost sudden, without long suffering or public alarm.”
Pope Francis greets the public on Sunday, April 20, at St. Peter’s Square. TIZIANA FABI/AFP via Getty
His official cause of death, at 7:35 a.m. local time on Monday, was determined to be from a cerebral stroke, coma and irreversible cardiocirculatory collapse, the Vatican previously said.
Francis had long grappled with health issues, including a 38-day stay in the hospital earlier this year for respiratory complications — with Strappetti, his nurse, almost always by his side. He also had arterial hypertension and Type 2 diabetes, the church said.
Still, he continued to work up until almost his last moments.
Francis had a “phenomenal work ethic,” his biographer Austen Ivereigh previously told PEOPLE. “That’s been true of him for decades. People who work with him say he hasn’t taken a holiday since the 1970s.”
Or, as Argentinean priest Esteban Alfon put it, Francis “always had the most needy in his heart.”
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