Navarrosa, who is currently writing his thesis on the pope’s 2016 encyclical 'Amoris Laetitia,' recalls meeting Francis in 2021 and says he had hoped to meet him again. “I’m not worried about the future of the church, because it is guided by the Holy Spirit,” he says.

The pontiff’s death initiated a well-structured series of rituals designed to mourn the loss of the 1.3 billion-member church’s leader and to ensure stability with the selection of a new pope.