Colorado Catholics are mourning the passing of Pope Francis, including a few who actually stood in Rome’s St. Peter’s Square on Easter morning, when the pontiff made an appearance, never imagining that it would be his last.

“My husband said his voice was weak,” said writer Megan Hjelmstad of Highlands Ranch, whose husband Peter and daughter Marie had called home following the pope’s address. A chance school trip sponsored by Marie’s Catholic school had put them in the Vatican on Easter Sunday.

Next day, the pair was entering a church 75 miles north in Orvieto when news arrived of Francis’ death. “They were shocked,” Hjelmstad said. “They were profoundly amazed that they had been some of the last people to see him.”

Hjelmstad is among many local Catholics who expressed admiration for the pontiff’s humble style, reflected in preparations for his funeral this weekend being attended by President Donald Trump, including a simpler coffin and a burial outside the Vatican, at a local parish that was a personal favorite.

Coloradans are also weighing in on the pope’s impact on church teachings at a moment of deep divisions among Americans involving social and cultural issues.

“A lot of it is politics, and that’s sad,” said John Paul Buchen, 19, who took time to speak with The Denver Gazette at Denver’s Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, viewed as a mother church to more than a half million Catholics served by the Archdiocese of Denver.

“The pope was very great at loving the poor, with talking about and encountering the poor, and seeing them as children of God,” he added.

Buchen noted that he felt that spirit was doubly important during times when staffers at the cathedral, on E. Colfax Avenue, a block from the Colorado state Capitol, serve the homeless and encounter homeless-related issues that have plagued downtown Denver since the start of the pandemic.

As the church in Rome begins meetings in preparation for its historic conclave of 135 cardinal electors expected to take place in the Sistine Chapel starting May 6, Catholics in Denver expressed what they hope would come from the balloting.

Buchen and Hjelmstad are among many who pray for a strong leader supportive of maintaining the church’s traditions and policies.

“I’ve been really convicted about how important it is to pray for the next pope,” said Hjelmstad, who had just published a book, “Offer It Up,” on the power of redemptive practices.

She said she had prayed frequently for Pope Francis.

The chair of the papacy, she said, marks an unbroken line to the apostle St. Peter.

“Even when there are ups and downs in the church and when you see so many political divides on candidates, the office is so important,” Hjelmstad said. “It’s less about my preferences than about the depth and importance of Christ’s shepherd on earth.”

“We’re a church that holds to the facts of Christ’s message of love and compassion,” added Conrad Steller, a real estate executive who worships at St. Thomas More Catholic Parish in Centennial, one of the largest in the Denver area.

Steller said that it is important for church electors to realize that conveying God’s message is a priority, not in making the public happy.

“From the beginning, it is the message our church has always promoted. This is not a church to be swayed by public opinion; that’s not the role of the church,” Steller said.

Others emphasized Pope Francis’ messages.

“Pope Francis was humble and he cared a lot for everybody, not just for our community,” Ruby Rivera, a staff member at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in North Denver, told The Gazette. “His advice on marriage was important.”

Of Catholics who spoke to The Denver Gazette, some said they feel strongly about marriage and about the church’s opposition on abortion.

While viewed as a progressive pontiff, Pope Francis, they said, consistently advocated for the traditional views on marriage, even as pushed for protections for same-sex couples. They noted he stood against extending the sacrament to unions other than between a man and a woman.

Francis also consistently described abortion as a sin, while allowing individual clergy to offer to be supportive and forgiving toward women who have had abortions.

That was an issue that divided some Colorado Catholics.

“I’m 100% pro-choice,” said Emily Rupp, a medical professional in the Denver Tech Center, who grew up in a Catholic church in western Kansas and still worships there on Sundays by Zoom.

“Make that a thousand percent,” she added.

Rupp told The Denver Gazette she hopes for a pope that would take a more progressive approach on abortion.

“I do believe in tradition but traditions outdate themselves. You have to keep up with a world as it is changing,” she said.

Her Zoom worship may reflect another concern that is attracting a focus among Catholics — whether the faith’s declines in identity among Americans can be reversed.

One study shows the population of those who identify as Catholic in Colorado declining by more than 5% from 2008 to 2022. Another shows attendance at mass dropping nationally by a quarter since the 1970s, with Colorado having reported even larger declines than the national average.

Those figures are set against a broader Pew Research study suggesting that fewer Coloradans identified with any Christian faith last year, and that Colorado’s decline in Christian identity ran ahead of the national average. Some noted those figures suggest even broader declines of faith among protestant denominations than among Catholics.

Rupp, the medical professional, is among those who believe that scandals involving sexual assault by priests, which made national headlines in the early 2000s, had damaged membership identity, particularly in western states.

“Pope Francis was a very mindful man. The Catholic religion has had a bad rap, and he did a good job of trying to make that better,” Rupp said.

“I want to see the betterment of the community of Catholicism. We need somebody to address that we’re not bad people, not a bad church, that we’re here for people and respect people and are open to loving everybody,” she added.

Should a new pope consider ending the church’s 900-year mandate requiring priests to shun marriage and remain celibate?

“I have thought that ever since I was a little girl,” Rupp said. “I definitely don’t think that’s something they should have to do; I have always thought that was unfair.”

Others doubt that the church is in decline, and are seeing optimistic signs of a rebirth of Catholic participation, particularly among younger age groups.

“So many people are trying to find a sense of purpose,” Conrad Steller said. “The church is in place to proclaim the word of God.”

“I have personally seen a reinvigoration of love of the church that’s surprising,” Magan Hjelmstad said, citing recent reports of record Catholic baptism events in France the United Kingdom, and a similar report from Orange County, California.

“There is a renewal and a degree of hope on the local level, a hope that the Holy Spirit leads someone to continue to inspire young people,” she said.