Thou­sands of peo­ple filed through the cen­tral aisle of St. Pe­ter’s Basil­i­ca to pay their fi­nal re­spects to Pope Fran­cis on Wednes­day, the start of three days of pub­lic view­ing ahead of the pon­tiff’s fu­ner­al.

Throngs of or­di­nary faith­ful made their way slow­ly to the 16th-cen­tu­ry basil­i­ca’s main al­tar, where Fran­cis’ sim­ple wood­en cas­ket was perched on a slight ramp, as four Swiss Guards stood at at­ten­tion. Over the com­ing days, tens of thou­sands of peo­ple are ex­pect­ed to pass through the basil­i­ca, which is stay­ing open un­til mid­night to ac­com­mo­date them.

Car­di­nals, mean­while, met in pri­vate to fi­nal­ize prepa­ra­tions for Sat­ur­day’s fu­ner­al and plan the con­clave to elect Fran­cis’ suc­ces­sor.

Fran­cis died on Mon­day at age 88, cap­ping a 12-year pon­tif­i­cate char­ac­ter­ized by his con­cern for the poor and mes­sage of in­clu­sion, but al­so some crit­i­cism from con­ser­v­a­tives who some­times felt alien­at­ed by his pro­gres­sive bent

Wednes­day opened with the bells of St. Pe­ter’s tolling as pall­bear­ers car­ried Fran­cis’ body from the Vat­i­can ho­tel where he lived in­to the basil­i­ca in a pro­ces­sion through the same pi­az­za where he had de­liv­ered what be­came his fi­nal good­bye. Fran­cis made a sur­prise pope­mo­bile tour through the faith­ful on East­er Sun­day, af­ter be­ing as­sured by his nurse he could de­spite his con­tin­ued frail health from a bout of pneu­mo­nia.

Car­di­nal Kevin Far­rell, who is run­ning the Vat­i­can tem­porar­i­ly un­til a new pope is elect­ed, led the pro­ces­sion down the cen­tral aisle to the al­tar, with clouds of in­cense pre­ced­ing him and the choir chant­i­ng the Litany of Saints hymn. In pairs, car­di­nals in red cas­socks ap­proached the cas­ket, bowed and made a sign of the cross, fol­lowed by small groups of pur­ple-robbed bish­ops, black-clad ush­ers, priests and nuns — and then the doors were thrown open to the pub­lic.

Heads of state are ex­pect­ed for Fran­cis’ fu­ner­al, but the three days of pub­lic view­ing in the basil­i­ca al­low or­di­nary Catholics to grieve the Ar­gen­tine pope. The view­ing ends Fri­day at 7 p.m., af­ter which Fran­cis’ cas­ket will be closed and sealed.

Sim­pli­fied rit­u­als re­flect Fran­cis’ wish­es

Fran­cis’ death and fu­ner­al in­au­gu­rates a care­ful­ly or­ches­trat­ed pe­ri­od of tran­si­tion in the 1.4 bil­lion-strong Catholic Church, with car­di­nals gath­er­ing over the com­ing days be­fore en­ter­ing in­to a con­clave, the se­cre­tive rit­u­al vot­ing in the Sis­tine Chapel to elect a new pope. There are 135 car­di­nals un­der age 80 and el­i­gi­ble to vote, and the new pon­tiff will like­ly come from with­in their ranks. The con­clave is not ex­pect­ed to be­gin be­fore May 5.

South Ko­re­an Car­di­nal Lazarus You He­ung-sik, who heads the Vat­i­can’s of­fice for priests, pre­dict­ed a short con­clave, but ac­knowl­edged the tran­si­tion is full of un­cer­tain­ties.

“We’ll see what the Holy Spir­it says,” he said Wednes­day. Asked if the next pope could come from Asia, where the Catholic Church is grow­ing, he in­sist­ed: “For the Lord, there’s no East or West.”

Papua New Guinea’s first and on­ly car­di­nal, John Ri­b­at, pre­pared Wednes­day to leave for Rome to par­tic­i­pate in the vote, pleased to rep­re­sent the poor South Pa­cif­ic is­land na­tion of 12 mil­lion peo­ple and more than 800 lan­guages in a Col­lege of Car­di­nals that Fran­cis great­ly di­ver­si­fied over 12 years.

“The im­por­tant thing is that … Papua New Guinea is part of the church, the glob­al church. And to be able to have a rep­re­sen­ta­tive from here to be in the con­clave, it is a big thing,” Rib­art told the Aus­tralian Broad­cast­ing Corp. He said he hoped the next pope would be some­one who could lead the church in “a way that is truth­ful and binds every­one to­geth­er.”

Fran­cis first lay in state in the Do­mus San­ta Mar­ta ho­tel in a pri­vate view­ing for Vat­i­can res­i­dents and the pa­pal house­hold. Im­ages re­leased by the Vat­i­can on Tues­day showed the pope in an open cas­ket, wear­ing the tra­di­tion­al point­ed head­dress of bish­ops and red robes, his hands fold­ed over a rosary. The Vat­i­can’s No. 2, Car­di­nal Pietro Parolin, was pic­tured pray­ing by Fran­cis.

Once in­side the basil­i­ca, Fran­cis’ cas­ket wasn’t put on an el­e­vat­ed bier — as was the case with past popes — but placed on a ramp, fac­ing the pews. It was in keep­ing with Fran­cis’ wish­es for all the rit­u­als sur­round­ing a pa­pal fu­ner­al to be sim­pli­fied to re­flect his be­lief that the pope’s role is that of sim­ple pas­tor, not world leader.

“For me, Pope Fran­cis rep­re­sents a great pas­tor, as well as a great friend to all of us,’’ said Mi­cale Sales, vis­it­ing St. Pe­ter’s Basil­i­ca from Brazil.

Ital­ian po­lice have tight­ened se­cu­ri­ty for the view­ing and the fu­ner­al, car­ry­ing out foot and horse pa­trols around the Vat­i­can, where pil­grims con­tin­ued to ar­rive for the Holy Year cel­e­bra­tions that Fran­cis opened in De­cem­ber. The faith­ful who walk through St. Pe­ter’s Holy Door dur­ing such years are grant­ed in­dul­gences, a way to help atone for sins.

“I think he spread a pos­i­tive mes­sage around the world, say­ing there shouldn’t be any vi­o­lence, there should be peace around the world,’’ said Amit Kukre­ja, from Aus­tralia.

Plan­ning for the con­clave is now un­der­way

The fu­ner­al has been set for Sat­ur­day at 10 a.m. in St. Pe­ter’s Square, and will be at­tend­ed by lead­ers in­clud­ing U.S. Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump and Ukrain­ian Pres­i­dent Volod­myr Ze­len­skyy.

Car­di­nals are con­tin­u­ing their meet­ings this week to plan the con­clave and make oth­er de­ci­sions about run­ning the Catholic Church.

His­to­ry’s first Latin Amer­i­can pon­tiff charmed the world with his hum­ble style and con­cern for the poor but alien­at­ed many con­ser­v­a­tives with cri­tiques of cap­i­tal­ism and cli­mate change.

Fran­cis had some reser­va­tions about his fi­nal pope­mo­bile tour through St. Pe­ter’s Square on East­er, Vat­i­can News re­port­ed on Tues­day. But he over­came them, the news agency said, and was thank­ful that he had greet­ed the crowd. He died the next morn­ing.

“The death of a pope is not a small thing, be­cause we’ve lost our leader,’’ Julio Hen­rique from Brazil said just out­side the basil­i­ca. “But still, in a few days, we will have a new leader. So … the thing of hope re­mains. Who will as­sume Pe­ter’s throne?”

In­sta­gram

Pope Fran­cis