Antonino Galofaro and Caroline Baudry with AFP 1:49 p.m., January 5, 2023, modified at 1:51 p.m., January 5, 2023

Pope Francis paid a final tribute on Thursday to his predecessor Benedict XVI, who died on Saturday at the age of 95, during the funeral of the former German pontiff in the solemn setting of Saint Peter's Square, in the presence of 50,000 faithful who mingled heads of state and crowned heads.

A solemn but sober funeral as Benedict XVI wanted.

Pope Francis presided over a sober Mass, punctuated by Gregorian chants, as the pope emeritus loved them in St. Peter's Square in Rome at the Vatican, before the eyes of the whole world and paid tribute to his predecessor.

"We are here with the perfume of gratitude and the ointment of hope to show him once again the love that is not lost. We want to do it with the same anointing wisdom, delicacy and dedication that he has been able to lavish over the years," he said.

A ceremony, punctuated by prayers and songs

At the end of the ceremony, the coffin was transported inside the majestic St. Peter's Basilica, where it was interred in the crypt where his predecessor, John Paul II, rested until his beatification in 2011, date to which his coffin had been moved.

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"It was really beautiful"

A hundred cardinals, 4,000 priests and more than 400 bishops converged on Saint Peter's Square for this final tribute to the former sovereign pontiff.

But it is of course the presence of several tens of thousands of faithful which shows the importance of the deceased in the Catholic world.

At the end of the ceremony, some worshipers stare blankly as they leave the esplanade.

This Italian family came from Genoa to attend the funeral.

"It was very beautiful, exciting. We had already gone to pay homage to the remains yesterday and participate in another mass. We were able to gather in prayer. It is always a great emotion to be in Rome", testifies this family father.

"It was a very beautiful mass. Me, I have never seen Pope Benedict, but I know that he was very good", continues his child.

A group of worshipers held up a banner with the inscription in Italian "Santosubito"

Marie, 23, has her sleeping bag open on her shoulders.

She ended her night in St. Peter's Square to settle in fourth row facing Pope Francis and the coffin of Benedict XVI.

"I was very touched by the exclamations of the crowd, 'Santo subito' and 'viva el papa', very moved when the coffin left because we lost a father and grandfather", confides- she at the microphone of Europe 1. She brings her mass booklet back to Paris as a souvenir and hopes that the pope of her childhood, she says, will know how to proclaim a saint.

In the crowd, a group of faithful waved a banner with the inscription in Italian "Santosubito" ("Holy immediately"), a slogan chanted during the funeral of John Paul II to demand his immediate canonization.