Catholics across New York City mourned the death of Pope Francis on Monday, praising him for his welcoming message of love and inclusivity as leader of a changing church in a changing world.
“Until the last day of his life he was a messenger of hope,” Bishop Robert Brennan, the head of the Diocese of Brooklyn, said during mass in downtown Brooklyn Monday afternoon.
He alluded to the pope’s final remarks on Easter Sunday, delivered by an aide, in which he called for peace in Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan and other war-torn nations — and for an end to the demonization of migrants.
“We are people of faith, and Pope Francis taught us to be pilgrims of hope,” Brennan said.
A small crowd gathered for afternoon mass the day after Easter. Among them was 78-year-old Rosa Williams, a lifelong Brooklynite.
“He cared very much for the marginalized and the poor and expressed that we should all have mercy on our fellow man,” she said, adding that his message in support of immigrants was important to her given the current political climate.
Mourners pray for Pope Francis during an afternoon mass at The Cathedral Basilica of St. James in Downtown Brooklyn, April 21, 2025. Credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY
“We’re all immigrants. We all have dreams that we came here for and to treat them so poorly just makes me really sad. He meant a lot to us because he was the Pope of the people,” Williams said.
Pope Francis, born in 1936 in Buenos Aires, Argentina as Jorge Mario Bergoglio, was the first Jesuit priest to become pope, as well as the first pope from Latin America. He was elected in March 2013, choosing the name of St. Francis of Assisi, who venerated the poor.
As leader of the Catholic church, with more than 1 billion members worldwide, Pope Francis sought compassion for the most marginalized people. He also stressed an openness towards the LGBTQ community. When asked about gay priests during his first news conference months into his role, he said “who am I to judge?” – a simple phrase that marked a major turn in the church’s acceptance of LGBTQ people, although he still opposed same-sex marriage.
“We shouldn’t marginalize people for this,” he told reporters at the time. “They must be integrated into society.”
Pope Francis visited New York City on a six-day tour of the United States in 2015, where he presided over mass for 20,000 at Madison Square Garden, visited the Sept. 11 memorial, held a prayer service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and had his own papal procession through Central Park. There are estimated to be around 3 million Catholics in New York City, which is served by the Archdiocese of New York and the Diocese of Brooklyn.
The day before his death, Pope Francis met briefly with Vice President JD Vance, even as he recently criticized policies pursued by the Trump administration. In February, Pope Francis penned a letter to Catholic bishops in the United States urging them to oppose any measure that labeled immigrants as illegal and called out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda.
“That he would die on Easter Monday, I think it’s so symbolic, because he lived through Easter,” said Mary Macchiarola, 84. “He was a man who truly was very close to God, to Jesus Christ because his message was clearly to reach out to the poor, the marginalized, the needy, and, and to see everybody in the image of God, everybody as being beautiful.”
At St. Sebastian’s Roman Catholic Church in Woodside, the faithful kneeled in prayer at a smaller chapel after 9 a.m. mass.
Minerva Lagran, 32, comes most mornings to pray. Today, she thought about Pope Francis.
“He was a kind person,” she said. “He prayed for everybody, he healed everybody.”
Bishop Robert Brennan leads a mass for Pope Francis at The Cathedral Basilica of St. James in Downtown Brooklyn, April 21, 2025. Credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY
Another parishioner, who declined to give her name, said Pope Francis’s inclusivity and welcomeness helped the church through a trying time.
“I hope to meet him in Heaven one day,” she said.
In Manhattan, Father Ben Hawley met parishioners outside St. Francis Xavier church in Greenwich Village Monday morning, letting them know there wouldn’t be a noon mass due to the Easter Monday schedule.
And he briefly spoke about Pope Francis’s legacy, saying his death “hit us like a ton of bricks.” St. Francis Xavier is aligned with the pope’s inclusive mission, with a “Black Lives Matter” sign and one welcoming immigrants on the gate.
Hawley, a late-in-life Catholic convert, became a priest in 2000, he said. He’s been at the current parish for seven months.
“The gospel message is not just inclusion – inclusion is too limited a word. It’s welcoming, honoring, affirming, caring for,” he said, noting that Pope Francis lived that.
“Francis put a public church face to the poor in ways that his predecessors had not.”
He stressed the work that has to happen after people are included, to help them get a deeper faith.
“There’s a tendency to emphasize inclusion to a point where, once you’re a little more inclusive, it’s like your work is all done,” he said. “No, you’re just getting going. Inclusion is opening the door, then the work starts.”
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