They went, Pope Francis joked in 2013, to the ends of the Earth to find him. The then-newly-anointed head of the Catholic Church was the first from Latin America to be pontiff. But the joke — as indeed his choice of name, drawn from Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of the poor — contained a deeper message. It signalled a new vision for the Church, one that would embrace the outcast and the marginalised. Under his leadership, the Pope said, it would be “a Church that is poor and for the poor”.
Pope Francis, who died this week aged 88 following a period of illness, never stopped speaking up for the disenfranchised and the disempowered, travelling around the world to urge peace, justice and reconciliation, even as his health began to fail. Born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in Buenos Aires, Argentina, he ascended to the highest office in the Vatican following the shock resignation of Pope Benedict XVI. As he reversed the course of conservatism set by his predecessors, the new pontiff quickly came to be viewed as an agent of necessary change at a time when the Church was being seen as out of step with the times. A believer in dialogue and debate, Pope Francis advocated empathy over doctrinal rigidity, simplicity over pomp. “Who am I to judge?” he once said, when a journalist questioned him about queer relationships. His ready smile and avuncular charm helped bridge the distance between the Church and the global laity, even as within the institution he pushed hard against overcentralisation of power in Rome. He nudged open doors that had long been closed by advocating a greater role for women and allowing priests to bless same-sex marriages. Not that his papacy was entirely without missteps. In 2018, for example, the pontiff expressed “shame” for mishandling sexual abuse allegations against Chilean clergy. And if traditionalists criticised him for going too far, for many progressives, he didn’t do enough.
And yet, over the course of his 12-year-long reign, Pope Francis emerged as one of the strongest moral voices of the time. He called for humane treatment of migrants, and was vocal about centring the needs of the poorest people and regions in the face of climate change. Pope Francis actively sought to forge ties with the Islamic world and consistently spoke up for people living amid violence and conflict, from Ukraine and South Sudan — where he kissed the leaders’ feet in 2019, as he implored for peace — to Gaza, the plight of whose embattled population he invoked in his final Easter address this Sunday. Even as the fissures of inequality and prejudice have deepened around the world, the unwavering commitment that Pope Francis displayed towards his vision for the Church and his tireless advocacy on behalf of the downtrodden will be his lasting legacy.
