A gay, lapsed Catholic on loving Pope Francis

Los Angeles Times

22-04-2025

Pope Francis met with Vice President JD Vance on Easter Sunday and then died. I'm not saying these things are related; I'm simply relaying the chain of events.
Although the timing lent an additional element of cinema to the inherently dramatic event of a pope's death, the news could hardly be called a surprise. Headlines about the late pontiff's deteriorating health had been making the rounds, and anyway, given the criteria for the position, a papal passing is never too far-fetched.
I've had plenty of time, then, to think about how I'd react to this moment. And yet, now that it's here, my feelings aren't what I expected. I guess I thought they'd be more mixed. Instead, I'm experiencing a simple, straightforward admiration for Pope Francis that I don't think I've ever felt for a world leader; as well as sadness for the loss of such a man, at a time when the very concept of principled leadership feels like it's on its deathbed.
Like many lapsed Catholics, my relationship to the Church is complicated. I understood from an early age that I'd been born into one of the more intricate religions. I'd only completed one of the seven sacraments (baptism, the freebie) when I realized that, in most Christian denominations in Oklahoma, you could waltz right into a service held in a former furniture store or warehouse and say, 'I go here now,' and that was more or less that. Our ceremonies, meanwhile, were held in ornate buildings featuring marble and spires and headed up by men in robes, not a youth pastor with frosted tips and cargo shorts. I'm not saying our way was better, only that it would be substantially more difficult to make 'The Da Vinci Code' out of, say, Methodism.
Yet I don't have too many nice things to say about the Catholic Church outside of the aesthetics, which are an unambiguous slay. The institution has a lot of baggage, as any organization with nearly two millennia and a few crusades under its cincture is bound to have. Earnestly defending it is the province of clergy or parishioners who take the whole thing much too seriously (read: converts). To that end, it's de rigueur for progressives to do a great deal of throat clearing before saying anything nice about it. To praise even its music or its famous artworks often comes with a massive, Spanish Inquisition-sized asterisk. Fair enough. As a practicing homosexual who supports abortion rights, I don't think the Church is counting on me to be its champion at drag brunch.
Complexity is baked into the institution, and even before I left the faith, I had complicated thoughts and feelings about it. Complexity, whether it takes the form of the Church's titles or its long history or its meticulous rites, is what distinguishes it as a religion in my experience. It's also what makes my feelings about Pope Francis' death remarkable to me, in that they're incredibly uncomplicated.
I considered just saying that my feelings were complicated anyway, but this would have been a lie, and lying makes me feel terribly guilty (I am one of St. Mary's Catholic School's more successful psychological experiments). So, here's my confession, Father: I'm a Pope Francis fan, and I wish we had more leaders like him.
Sure, one could argue that he benefits from the bar being set so low. His predecessor sort of looked like Palpatine in Prada shoes, and his contemporary detractors are perhaps best typified by verified X accounts with Knights Templar profile pictures making threads about how 'DEI killed Christ.' Certainly, not all his critics are so unhinged, and there are many things I personally disagreed with him on, but he always reminded me of the very best of Catholicism. It's been many years, but before Catholicism became a trend among reactionary podcast hosts, I knew it as the faith that taught me that the meek would inherit the earth, that it was immoral to be wealthy while others starved and that we ought to follow in the footsteps of a man who said, 'All those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all those who humble themselves will be exalted.'
Right up to his last breath, Francis advocated for the powerless, for those who have so little and yet are villainized by people in positions of authority. 'How much contempt is stirred up at times toward the vulnerable, the marginalized and migrants!' he said in his Easter address, shortly before his death. 'On this day, I would like all of us to hope anew and to revive our trust in others, including those who are different than ourselves or who come from distant lands, bringing unfamiliar customs, ways of life and ideas.'
This plea stands in stark contrast to our authoritarian milieu in the United States, which is defined by active contempt for the weak. It increasingly seems like our world is dominated by two types of leaders: those guided by gleeful, vindictive spite, and those guided by wherever the wind happens to be blowing that day. It's a match made in hell, and hell is exactly what awaits us if we continue to permit abuses against people who we're told are acceptable targets. It's no surprise that those profiting off of such scaremongering have dismissed Francis as 'the woke pope.' There's a vested interest in euphemizing and dismissing kindness itself. What we need, I believe, are people willing to defend kindness without any caveats, people willing to stand up for the weak even if the weak can give nothing in return, because it's the right thing to do. In this way, I hope the life of Pope Francis serves as an inspiration.
What I'll remember about Pope Francis is his unflagging support for migrants and refugees. I'll remember the compassion he showed LGBTQ+ people, a stance that, while imperfect, was radical for the Church. I'll remember that he was one of the very few major figures in the West to call for a ceasefire in Gaza — leave it to the Democratic Party to be outflanked on its left by a medieval institution, I guess. I'll remember that he once said, 'I like to think of hell as empty.'
We can never truly know what's really in someone's heart, of course, and no one is perfect. But I do believe our world would be a better place if it was being run by people who see themselves not as kings but as servants. Despite it all, I do think such a world is possible. It's a simple matter of faith, I suppose.