The night before Pope Francis was laid to rest halfway around the world, Catholics gathered in Stoughton for a special mass.

A Catholic Charities Boston leader, a couple from Mass. on their honeymoon and a Cambridge boys’ choir were thrilled to see Pope Francis in Rome in recent years. They now feel more blessed, to have seen ‐ and in some cases meet ‐ the pontiff before he died on Monday.

Tens of thousands of people flocked to the Vatican for the funeral of Pope Francis. The beloved pontiff, the first Latin American pope in history, died earlier this week at the age of 88.