Editor’s note: Following the death of Pope Francis on April 21, 2025, the editors of Where Peter Is received many tributes to his life and reflections on his influence from past and current contributors, as well as podcast guests and friends of the site from all over the world. We will publish a few of these reflections every day leading up to the conclave. —ML
Pope Francis: Into the Fullness of Faith
By Karen Dear
In May of 2022 my family – my husband, our daughter and I – began the process of discerning our call home to the Catholic Church, and I can say we are here because of Pope Francis. Like many of us who venture on this journey, my background and life as well as my husband’s is wrought with brokenness and trauma. My own Father was raised Catholic. He was an altar boy, and attended Catholic School. He left the church in 1962 during the Vatican II Councils to marry my mother who was a devout United Methodist. Methodists follow the liturgical calendar, and like the Catholic Church have many traditions like the Stations at the Cross. John Wesley our founder was a devout man of faith from England and so in Methodism we feel the influence of the Church of England. Wesley preached the Gospel to the poor and went out on mission to care for those on the margins. But where Catholics teach infused righteousness, as exemplified through the Saints and the incarnational reality of the Eucharist, Methodists teach an ‘imputed’ righteousness. My husband and I were both baptized as infants and confirmed in the United Methodist Church. We were also both left by our fathers in our youth. Where the Catholic Church is clear on the teaching of marriage, many branches of Protestantism are not, as exemplified by our Protestant ancestors.
I have found in Pope Francis an earthly father that exemplifies our heavenly father, one full of compassion, mercy, kindness, and an unconditional welcome born from an agape love. But this welcome at the same time called us to be transformed in the love of God. God meets us where we are, but he does not leave us there. The path of following Christ and daily metanoia, daily dying to self – seeking the Lord’s ways and not our own was always the way of our Holy Father Francis. (Isaiah 55:8-9)
Where the Protestant world is wrought with denominations and divisions from the political left to right, I saw in Pope Francis a fullness of faith that I had been longing for, one that honored the Magisterium, but sought to find new ways to faithfully respond to church teaching in approaching the difficult and complicated realities of people’s lives. New ways that could open-up the Eucharist and the Gospel to all people striving to honor the Lord’s call home. His message on human dignity in particular resonated strongly: a clear consistent social ethic from conception to death. And he refused to be tempted by power and status. He sought to be present and see people in all walks of life as worthy of attention and kindness, seeing the face of Christ in the world amongst us all.
In a personally relevant matter, on Feb 2, 2005 – the Feast of the Presentation of our Lord, I was delivered from bondage, a very dark place, by the Lord’s grace. All went from darkness to light in a single moment – at the same time it was a profound moment of reckoning which has taken years to travel through. It has indeed been a pilgrim’s journey of striving and searching to do my part to ‘make things right’ according to God’s will, mercy and grace – all I wanted at the time was church. In my heart, I longed for the oldest most established church that I could find, and being Methodist at that time – I found the oldest Methodist church in town, one about 125 years old, and threw myself into choir and serving while attending A.A. meetings and recovering. Now I know, what I was really longing for, and what God had mapped out on my heart was to eventually come home to the Catholic Church, the truly oldest and most established of all. Out of Chaos the Lord has brought order to our lives (Genesis 1-2:4, John 1:1-5) but slowly and gradually for a bruised reed he will not break:
Isaiah 42:3
“a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice.”
God’s timing is always perfect. My journey to seminary beginning in December of 2013, serving in long term care facility ministry, recovery ministry, and in prison ministry paralleled the papacy of Pope Francis. Even before I was Catholic, I looked to him for encouragement and I found hope in his words and his example. And as stated, now because of him, I am finally home in the Catholic Church. My family was received into full communion with the Catholic Church in 2023. Our lives have and will never be the same. Our lives in Christ in the Catholic Church have brought a much needed healing through the Eucharist and finally being home on solid ground. No matter the troubles around us, the imperfections of the church, or the hurt of church – still – we are home on solid ground, filled with expectancy and eternal purpose, the ever-living and present hope of Christ.
So, with the passing of Pope Francis, so too, our lives enter into a new phase in the life of the church. His presence, example and encouragement will be deeply grieved. Pope Francis has been my earthly Father during a time in my life and my husband’s life where there was great void. He was an example of persevering love, mercy and compassion. Like the father of the prodigal son, running to welcome us home. From a heart overflowing with deep and abiding gratitude, thank you, Pope Francis, I will miss you terribly.
Karen Dear is a reader of WPI who offered this contribution in memory of Pope Francis.
The Joyful Servant
By Sister Fancy Kunda, SSHJM
“I want to say one word to you and this word is joy. Wherever consecrated people are, there is always joy!”
. Your words will forever be etched in my heart.Pope Francis:
by Fr Richard Gleeson
So easy to love. So hard to emulate. He had me as his own when in an interview – in America I think – the journo asked him, “Who is Pope Francis?” and he answered “a sinner”. My eyes watered a touch. And then he was asked what should the Church be about in today’s world and without thinking he immediately replied: “A Field Hospital …. healing wounds and warming hearts”…. vulnera sanare et corda fovere … this has become one of my favourite insights/ mottos of sorts. When he told the gay Musician from the UK that he believed we should treat others as nouns and not adjectives…. I thought my goodness. Was this how people found the Nazarene when he was on the job back then? I loved the serious, faith filled devotion at Holy Mass and at the Narrative of Institution. His brilliant homilies so grounded and incarnational. I felt pained by the way so many abused Pope Francis, defamed him, and twisted virtually everything he did and said… Baptized, Confirmed, even Ordained they should have passed under grace from ultra religiosity to missionary disciples in communion. And those toxic Bishops simply disgusted me, and still do, and many others feel the same way. This Pharisaic opposition has convinced me all the more that this man Francis was as we say in Australia ….. true blue ….. fair dinkum. REAL. I pray for the Happy Repose of the Soul of Pope Francis the GREAT.
Father Richard Gleeson is a retired priest from New South Wales, Australia.
If you would like to add your own reflection to this series, please send it via email by clicking on the “Article Submissions” tab above, with the subject line “Reflection.” The recommended length is 200-300 words. Longer submissions will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis and may be subject to editing. We may not be able to publish all submissions.
Image: “pope-francis-visits-philippines” (CC BY-SA 2.0) by ThiênLong
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