Toronto, ON April 21, 2025 – The Catholic Civil Rights League (CCRL) joins the universal Church in mourning the death of His Holiness Pope Francis, who passed into eternal life on Easter Monday, April 21, 2025, at the age of 88. His death, within the Octave of Easter, comes during the most joyful season of the Church’s liturgical year, when Christians celebrate the triumph of the Risen Christ over sin and death — the very hope to which Pope Francis bore witness throughout his pontificate.
From the beginning of his papacy, Pope Francis placed mercy at the heart of his ministry. His episcopal motto — Miserando atque eligendo, “Having mercy, He called him” — revealed a vision of the Church as the living instrument of God’s mercy in the world. His Jubilee Year of Mercy in 2015 invited the faithful to rediscover the tender face of the Father, and his pastoral style continually urged the Church to go out to the peripheries, to accompany the suffering, and to speak with a voice of conscience and compassion.
His death occurs within the Novena of Divine Mercy Sunday — the Sunday after Easter Sunday —within the sacred days of the Easter Octave, a liturgical time when the Church meditates on the boundless mercy of God revealed in the Resurrection. This connection is all the more poignant given Pope Francis’s own devotion to mercy and his spiritual kinship with Pope St. John Paul II, who instituted the feast and died on its vigil in 2005.
The CCRL also remembers with particular gratitude Pope Francis’s steadfast witness during the COVID-19 pandemic. In one of the most iconic and spiritually moving moments of his pontificate, the world watched as he stood alone in a rain-soaked St. Peter’s Square in March 2020, praying before the Blessed Sacrament and the crucifix, interceding for the people of Rome and for the entire world. It was a moment that transcended words — a shepherd interceding for his flock, and a sign of the Church’s presence amid fear, isolation, and grief.
As the first pope from the Americas and the first Jesuit to ascend the Chair of Peter, Pope Francis brought a new voice to the papacy — one marked by simplicity, global awareness, and a deep desire to bring the healing balm of the Gospel to a wounded world. His call for dialogue, for peace, and for renewed missionary zeal inspired countless Catholics to live their faith more fully.
We give thanks for the life and ministry of Pope Francis, and we entrust his soul to the mercy of the Risen Lord. We pray for the Church he so faithfully served — unam, sanctam, catholicam et apostolicam Ecclesiam — and we invoke the Holy Spirit’s guidance upon the College of Cardinals as they prepare to elect his successor.
Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat ei.
Requiescat in pace. Amen.
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About the CCRL
Catholic Civil Rights League (CCRL) (www.ccrl.ca) assists in creating conditions within which Catholic teachings can be better understood, cooperates with other organizations in defending civil rights in Canada, and opposes defamation and discrimination against Catholics on the basis of their beliefs. The CCRL was founded in 1985 as an independent lay organization with a large nationwide membership base. The CCRL is a Canadian non-profit organization entirely supported by the generosity of its members.
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For further information:
ccrl@ccrl.ca
416-466-8244
@CCRLtweets