One of the first pilgrims to see the remains of St. Francis, Brother Marco Borgioli, a Franciscan friar from Florence, arrived early on Sunday, so he could see dawn break over Assisi.
He was not alone.
As Brother Marco approached the basilica where the saint’s remains are kept, he found many hundreds of people of all ages. “It’s striking that after 800 years, Francis is alive. He’s not a museum, he’s alive, and he touches people’s hearts,” he said.
To commemorate the 800th anniversary of the death of the saint, the bones believed to be his were removed on Saturday from a crypt at the basilica that bears his name. They were brought by solemn procession to the church above, where they will be on display for a month.
Objects that belonged to the saint have long been exhibited at the basilica. But his remains, preserved in a nitrogen-filled plexiglass case, have been shown to the public just once, briefly, in 1978.
“So many people love Francis, all over the world,” said Brother Marco Moroni, the custodian of the Franciscan convent attached to the basilica. “So why not allow many people the opportunity to share this joy?”
According to the convent, nearly 400,000 people have already registered for a time slot to see the relics of one of Christianity’s most beloved saints.
Many more are expected to arrive without reservations. That is causing some anxiety for Valter Stoppini, the mayor of Assisi. He has to balance the needs of pilgrims from afar, seeking a once-in-a-lifetime experience, with those of the hilltop town’s 28,000 residents. They are used to the occasional tourist invasion, but not a monthlong siege.
“I hope to survive,” Mr. Stoppini said.
Assisi has drawn pilgrims since St. Francis died here in 1226, after founding an order that spread across the world.
Visitors flock to the basilica, a treasure chest of 13th- and 14th-century art. Younger faithful have recently been coming to pray to Carlo Acutis, the Roman Catholic Church’s first millennial saint, who died in 2006, was canonized last year and is buried in Assisi.
But St. Francis remains the town’s star attraction, especially for Italians. He is their nation’s patron saint and part of the bedrock of their identity, some say.
Aldo Cazzullo, the author of a popular book on St. Francis published in 2025, calls him “the first Italian.”
St. Francis wrote the Canticle of the Creatures, “considered to be the first poem written in Italian,” Mr. Cazzullo said. He called the saint the “precursor of humanism, which is the great gift that we Italians have given to civilization.”
Even the cappuccino, “Italy’s national beverage,” has ties to St. Francis, Mr. Cazzullo argued. Marco d’Aviano, a 17th-century friar of the Capuchin order, which is part of the Franciscan tradition, is said to have invented it by adding milk to coffee.
Alessandro Barbero, a historian who also wrote a best seller about the saint, said that “depending on the centuries, both civil authorities and the church did everything they could to make Italians feel that they were in some way the proprietors of St. Francis.”
When Pope Pius XII named St. Francis the patron saint of Italy in 1939, Mussolini’s government made his feast day, Oct. 4, a national holiday. That was revoked in 1977, but Parliament reinstated it last year, in a rare near-unanimous vote.
St. Francis’ message — he is known as a champion of peace and protecting the environment — has informed modern-day causes. Since 1961, tens of thousands have joined occasional peace marches from the town of Perugia to Assisi. Pope Francis, who chose his papal name to honor the saint, titled his groundbreaking encyclical on climate change “Laudato Si,” or “Praise be to You,” a refrain from the Canticle of the Creatures.
Brother Marco, the custodian at the convent, said that while he expected tremendous interest in seeing the remains, a month of public viewing was all the friars could handle.
“It’s been much more complicated than we imagined,” he said, mentioning heightened security measures and the need for medical staff.
St. Francis was buried in the basilica in 1230, but the precise location of his remains was unknown for centuries. A tomb believed to be his was discovered in 1818, and after an investigation, Pope Pius VII declared that the bones it contained were the saint’s.
Since then, the remains have been exhumed just a handful of times, to verify that they were intact and give the friars a moment of private prayer. The public was allowed to see them only during the brief viewing in 1978.
Now the world has been invited, at a clip of 1,500 per hour.
Coming out of the basilica on Sunday, Cristina Berretta, a teacher from nearby Bastia Umbra, said the line had moved quickly, “to give everyone the chance to pay special homage.” She said that was appropriate for this “historic event,” which she hoped would have lasting effects.
St. Francis “can bring us back to a message of peace,” she said. “We all hope that this event will awaken everyone’s spirit.”
Elisabetta Povoledo is a Times reporter based in Rome, covering Italy, the Vatican and the culture of the region. She has been a journalist for 35 years.
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