BREAKING: Pope Francis Dies at 88. Here's How He Should Be Remembered
The late pontiff was a progressive pope who was outspoken on Trump, Gaza, the climate, and more.
He was the first non-European pope in almost 1,300 years, the first to name a woman to lead a major Vatican department, and the first Jesuit. Jorge Mario Bergoglio, aka Pope Francis, presided over so much radical change during his time as head of the Catholic Church that even some of his fellow Christians ended up turning against him.
The late pontiff, who sadly passed away on Monday at the age of 88, hours after a brief and clearly reluctant meeting with JD Vance, made plenty of bold statements that rattled conservatives around the world, and led to headlines such as “Anti-reform cardinals 'want the Pope to quit'” and “The war against Pope Francis.”
Here are seven hot-button issues on which Pope Francis was outspoken, as we should not allow parts of our mainstream media to depoliticize a very political and very progressive pope:
1. Trump and Vance
Pope Francis, a supporter of migrants and refugees who constantly cited the biblical commandment to ‘love the stranger,’ clashed with Donald Trump on more than one occasion. In February 2016, during the US presidential campaign, the late pontiff suggested Trump “was not a Christian.” In February of this year, Pope Francis rebuked JD Vance’s understanding of Catholicism and condemned the Trump administration’s draconian immigration policies: “The act of deporting people who in many cases have left their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, damages the dignity of many men and women.”