By Tom Klocek

The United States, after the last election, is turning the corner in rebuilding a constitutional government — smaller, more efficient, less intrusive, and stronger. With the death of Pope Francis, the Church also has an opportunity to return to the basics of Catholicism and Christianity in general.

In many ways, the reign of Pope Francis was focused more on the secular world than the spiritual one. While Francis repeatedly emphasized the evils of abortion and transgenderism and supported reaching out to the poor, he also tended toward political issues under the guise of brotherhood and caring for God’s creation in ways that ran contrary to Catholic teaching.

Although he was stridently opposed to abortion, likening it to the hiring of a hitman, and stated that transgenderism was demonic, in many ways he was a modernist and overtly political. During this interregnum and the conclave, there will be many speaking out on both sides of the Francis issue.

What is clear, however, is that, learning from Francis’s pontificate, the Church needs to return to its roots. When sports teams have poor seasons and talk about rebuilding, one thing they usually say is that they are focusing on and returning to the basics. This is essential for the Church to move forward. The Church will survive; Jesus promised that. But if it is going to continue to draw people to Christ, it must put off worldliness. One only has to look at Germany to see how a focus on worldliness and secularism can destroy the Church.

Archbishop (Emeritus) Chaput put it very well: “Having said that, an interregnum between papacies is a time for candor. The lack of it, given today’s challenges, is too expensive. In many ways, whatever its strengths, the Francis pontificate was inadequate to the real issues facing the Church.” (Read the rest of his statement here.)

Speaking on the encyclical, Amoris Laetitia, Bishop Barron noted, in a mixed summary of Pope Francis’ pontificate, “If a primary responsibility of the pope is to maintain unity in doctrine and morals, it is hard to see how Pope Francis met that obligation throughout that synodal process and its aftermath.”

There were several issues of Francis’s pontificate that I found disturbing. Not long after his election, during which everyone thought he would be a continuation of the many strengths of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope St. John Paul II, it seemed that he took a sharp left turn. In actuality, left and right should have no real meaning in the Church. The Church is Catholic, period. The Holy Spirit through the Magisterium has guided the Church for two millennia, well summarized in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) with links to Holy Scripture and the writings of many saints, including the Church Fathers. It is the deposit of faith.

Some of the issues I have, among many, include many of his leanings toward secularism, modernism, and indifferentism. In the secular vein, his repeated welcoming of modernist issues and personages, who were defiant in their antagonism of basic Church teaching and doctrine, going so far as to even suggest that Our Lord’s words captured in the gospels needed “editing.” For example, his opposition to the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) was a lesson in modernism — new = good, old = bad. While I am not a regular attendee at the TLM, I see the beauty and attraction for it and it is bringing people to Christ, the fruit of evangelization.

Even in many of the positive statements he made, his actions did not back up his words. Fr. Rupnik, an admitted sexual predator, once excommunicated, was reinstated by Francis. His repeated dealings with Fr. Martin and New Age Ministries (declared non-Catholic by the American bishops) and the issuance of Fiduciae Supplicans allowing for blessing of homosexual couples defied Church teaching. While asking the German bishops to rethink and turn away from their “Synodal Way,” he never put his foot down. In the meantime, he stripped Bishop Strickland, a strong orthodox American bishop, of his diocese, he refused to answer the cardinals who questioned him on confusing segments of Amoris Laetitia, and he treated Cardinal Burke (one of those cardinals who also questioned other actions) poorly.

His continued criticism of President Trump’s ideas on building a wall and controlling immigration did not reflect that he instituted at least as strict, if not more so, restrictions on people, including migrants, entering the Vatican.

He seemed avid toward evangelization while at the same time he seemed an advocate of indifferentism. He also basically abdicated any control of the Church, including the naming of bishops, to the atheist communist regime in China, who themselves are rewriting the bible and the catechism with a communist flavor. Quick, check Pope St. John XXIII to see if he’s rolling over, for he said: “Pope Pius XI further emphasized the fundamental opposition between communism and Christianity and made it clear that no Catholic could subscribe even to moderate socialism.”

While many of his arguments may have been valid in general, such as care for the planet and the longtime Catholic doctrine of ultimate destination of goods, well-articulated by Pope Leo XIII in his encyclical Rerum Novarum, he frequently presented them in a way that seemed more political than catechetical or pastoral. In doing so, he came across as more divisive than unifying. It almost seemed that he wanted to unify the Church more to the world than to bring about unity within the many cliques in the Church itself, again presenting an attitude of indifferentism.

One continuous lack in all of my concerns about him was that, while he seemed open to many things (including “settled” issues like homosexual actions), his message rarely addressed the need for repentance (turning away from sin), with which Jesus began His ministry, “Repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15). This was blatantly obvious at World Youth Day 2023 with his emphasis on welcoming all but with no mention of the need for conversion. Yes, Christ wants us to come as we are, but then He demands change. To put it kindly, he seemed to be trying to be “pastoral” to a fault, in opposition to St. Augustine by overlooking the sin. Rebuke causes useful pain such “that you may seek the Physician [God]; for it is not profit unless it makes a man repent of his sin.” (St. Augustine, On Rebuke and Grace)

Some commentators note that one of Francis’ goals was to “make things messy.” In that regard, he was a success.

It may be that Francis was just the pope the Church needed, much like Joe Biden was the president we needed to shock the complacent into a much-needed awakening of the downward spiral path on which were traveling at breakneck speed. People seek truth, which is foundational for the Church. Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but by me.” (John 14:6) This may be the real reason people seem to be returning to the Church. “For where I found truth, there found I my God, Who is Truth itself.” (St. Augustine, Confessions)