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
He brought me to the peripheries
Image: Nathan Turowsky
By Nathan Turowsky
I often think about seeing Pope Francis in the Popemobile in St. Peter’s Square in 2018, right after the canonization Mass for, among others, Oscar Romero and Pope Paul VI. At that time I was relatively new to Catholic practice and susceptible to grumpy trad-adjacent narratives on things like liturgy and Church history, although I’ve always been too anti-authoritarian and my social circles have always been too gay for me to have fully subscribed to that vi
ew of things. He came out in the little car and waved and it was, on a pre-ideological and even pre-religious level, just such a cool experience. A bit later I started seriously looking into his teachings about going to the peripheries, which brought me around on his papacy entirely, or rather returned me to an earlier phase (before I was even Catholic) of intense enthusiasm about it. (“Going to the Peripheries” is the title of the first essay I ever wrote, in June of the following year, for Where Peter Is). My academic study had been in East Asian and particularly
Japanese Christianity, and I’ve found Francis’s attention to the Church in Asia remarkable ever since I started to be more aware of it. I’d recommend Cardinal Charles Maung Bo’s interview on Francis’s legacy to anyone who hasn’t read it; he says a lot of this better than I ever could.
I’ll always treasure the picture that I took.
Laudato Si’ finally won my heart and intellect to Pope Francis
by Gareth Thomas Weaver
As convert I have lived in the Catholic Church under three popes during three decades. I gave my unquestioning obedience to John Paul II and Benedict XVI; and then I regrettably spent the initial years of Pope Francis’s pontificate in rebellion, aligned with people who I took far too long to recognize were in radical error. I had brought with me from my Anglican faith a strong devotion to the mystical poverty of the saints of Assisi, so it was Laudato Si which finally won my heart and intellect to Pope Francis’s spiritual and temporal project. As a lifelong traveller on the roads to Compostela, about which I have written for WPI, I now understand my Catholic re-conversion under the shepherding of Pope Francis to be a pilgrimage. He was there on the road ahead of me a long while. I obstinately kept my distance, preferring the fun of walking with a bunch of people who didn’t care about the destination but enjoyed the banter on the road. Then gradually — out of curiosity perhaps — I struck out alone and drew nearer to him. Then I recognised in him all the signs of the true Shepherd and I walked alongside him with a sure step. Now his physical leadership has been taken from us, I guess the first lesson I have learned is to give my obedience to his successor from Day 1.
I was ignited in a new way
By Theresa Zoe Williams
Before Pope Francis, I was a JP2 kid — ignited and inflamed by the love of God for me. I wanted others to know that love, too, but I was very inwardly focused. That’s fine! We all need to do personal work. But after Pope Francis raised the Eucharist high to an empty St. Peter’s Square during the pandemic, I was ignited in a new way. Pope Francis made me take all of my inward growth and point it outward, learning to love others as God does, not just hand them off to the nebulous God in the clouds. Pope Francis made my faith tactile, giving, real. By his example, I saw God in absolutely everyone I met, no matter their personal faith or decisions. The God of love in the Eucharist that I hold so dear? He is not just for everyone, but in everyone. I suddenly learned more about God from interacting with all kinds of people than I had when only studying God in the Word, God in the abstract, God in me. Pope Francis taught me about Jesus the person, Jesus the act of charity, and my life and faith will never be the same. Pope Francis was not perfect, but he was good and I miss him dearly.
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: Vatican Media
Nathan Turowsky is a native New Englander, an alumnus of Boston University School of Theology, and one of the relatively few Catholic alumni of that primarily Wesleyan institution. He works in the nonprofit sector and writes at Silicate Siesta.
Gareth Thomas lives a solitary life in the mountains in Spain with his donkeys. A former aircraft engineer, Franciscan friar and geography teacher, he is a veteran of the pilgrim routes to Compostela.
Theresa Zoe Williams is a writer with credits all over the Catholic inter-webs. She received her BA in Theology, Catechetics/Youth Ministry, and English Writing from Franciscan University of Steubenville. She has contributed to the books Catholic Hipster Handbook: The Next Level and Epic Saints: Wild, Wonderful, and Weird Stories of God's Heroes. And has written her own book, A Catholic Field Guide to Fairy Tale Princesses. She is Pennsylvanian by birth, Californian by heart, and in Ohio for the time being. She writes at The Future Patron Saint of Liars and Fakes at www.theresazoewilliams.substack.com. Yinz can find her on Twitter @TheresaZoe.
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