Pope Francis, a socially progressive champion for the poor, but conservative on other matters

Pope Francis was a humble man who lived his faith and was a champion for the poor.

But he was also a paradox to many Catholic scholars: a leader who appeared to be both progressive and conservative, depending on the issue.

There’s broad agreement, though, that he left his own indelible mark on the Church, having been set the unenviable task of succeeding two of the most influential Pontiffs of the past century, John Paul II and Benedict XVI.

He brought a modern, less formal approach to the role, plus much more besides.

He was also responsible for navigating a tumultuous and ruinous period, when the Church was embroiled in worldwide uproar from the misery caused by shameful sex abuse of children and clerical cover-ups.

Jorge Mario Bergoglio was born on 17 December 1936 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was the son of Italian immigrants.

As a young man, he had a lung removed because of an infection.

His election as Supreme Pontiff on 13 March 2013 was remarkable for many reasons, not least because he was considered an outsider for the position.

Pope Francis was the first non-European Pope in a thousand years and the first from the southern hemisphere ever. He was also the first Jesuit to be elected.

Jesuits belong to a male order of the Church in which members swear vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.

It explained his sober and austere lifestyle, eschewing all grandeur and luxuriant amenities, including the accommodation made available to his predecessors. Instead, he lived in a simple apartment and cooked his own supper.

He also showed no interest in the palatial papal summer residence at Castel Gandolfo.

His “common touch” a was a big part of his appeal.

“My people are poor and I am one of them,” he explained.

In an annual Holy Thursday ritual symbolising humility, Pope Francis washed and dried the feet of a dozen prisoners, regardless of their religion. He would then kiss their feet and assure them of their dignity, saying “any of us” can fall into sin.

A key theme of his papacy was the urging of mercy, which he described as the true face of love and the beating heart of the Gospel.

It’s not surprising then that he was strong advocate for social justice. He even wrote an encyclical on climate change, stating the church viewed it as a moral issue that must be addressed in order to protect the Earth and everyone on it.

“Never have we so hurt and mistreated our common home as we have in the last two hundred years,” he wrote. “Reducing greenhouse gases requires honesty, courage and responsibility.”

In another encyclical in 2020, he criticised laissez-faire capitalism, saying it created “an economy of exclusion and inequality” and that “such an economy kills.”

He attacked the “dogma of neoliberal faith” that “resort[s] to the magic theories of ‘spillover’ or ‘trickle.’”

On social media, he lamented that “social aggression has found unparalleled room for expansion through computers and mobile devices.”

He allowed the blessing of same-sex couples and confirmed that transgender people could be baptised and serve as godparents. He said the church should apologise to gay people rather than judge them.

Divorced and civilly remarried Catholics were permitted to receive communion.

But he remained steadfast in rejecting women priests, gay marriage, birth control, among other orthodox positions.

Pope Francis went further than any predecessor in his condemnation of paedophile priests and other clergy who had helped to cover up their crimes, putting more children in danger.

Early in his papacy he asked for forgiveness for the “evil” damage to victims. He said the abuse was a “moral damage carried out by men of the Church”, and that “sanctions” would be imposed.

And in a letter to the world’s 1.2bn Roman Catholics, he called for an end to the “culture of death” in the Church, addressing its failures to deal with abuse and again asking for forgiveness.

In the 2018 encyclical to “the People of God” he described the “heart-wrenching pain of these victims” that were “long ignored, kept quiet or silenced”.

“With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives,” he writes.

“We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them.”

“It is essential that we, as a Church, be able to acknowledge and condemn, with sorrow and shame, the atrocities perpetrated by consecrated persons, clerics, and all those entrusted with the mission of watching over and caring for those most vulnerable. Let us beg forgiveness for our own sins and the sins of others.”

One year later, he issued a landmark decree making bishops directly accountable for sexual abuse or covering it up.

The decree required clerics to report any cases to their superiors.

But survivors’ groups and victims advocates claims Pope Francis failed to back up his words with effective reforms, such as mandating crimes be reported to police. Many also called for the Church to implement a “one strike and you’re out” policy.

The desecration of trust over the crisis has continued to damage the Church and drive many away.

Congregations sizes waned in the West, but devotion remained as strong as ever in other parts of the world. More than 600,000 people last year attended Pope Francis’ history-making Mass in East Timor last year. Almost 98 per cent of the country identifies as Catholic.

Pope Francis won plaudits for his determination and efforts to stamp out corruption in the Vatican. This included cleaning up the scandal-plagued Institutes for the Works of Religion, also known as the Vatican Bank.

In his very first week he fired the entire board of the Vatican’s financial watchdog.

He also waded into the Vatican’s powerful bureaucracy, the Roman Curia, improving its efficiency and transparency, and in 2022 giving it a new Constitution, that opened up all Vatican offices to lay leadership; a move described by Catholic scholars as “revolutionary”.

Pope Francis, who died aged 88, was man of great humility and mercy, and as a leader, was a reformer who did his best over 12 years to open up his Church to the modern world.