In a world divided by politics and ideology, Pope Francis offered a countercultural message of simplicity, inclusion, and radical empathy.
Few know this better than Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski. He joined NPR’s Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep on Monday morning to reflect on the legacy of a pontiff he came to know personally. The popular pontiff died of a stroke at age 88.
Wenski said Pope Francis’ real power lay in how he lived — simply and deliberately.
Francis’ legacy, according to Wenski, is that of a pontiff who invited the world to expand its moral imagination, to see not problems but people, and to recognize that dignity knows no border.
Here are excerpts from Inskeep’s interview with Archbishop Wenski.
STEVE INSKEEP: I know that you met with Francis a number of times. What was he like in conversation?
WENSKI: Well, he was very relaxed, very at ease, with a sense of humor. I remember the first time I met him, I was telling him that I was from Miami, and then I told him that the best thing about being in Miami is that it's so close to the United States. And he thought that was very funny, and then he laughed uproariously. And he would be aware of Miami as being from Argentina because Miami as you know, is the capital of Latin America.
Exactly. I like that he was up with that joke, and it reflects his background as a person from South America, from Latin America. Now, Ruth Sherlock just now said that he championed the poor and those suffering in conflict. I want to underline this is not exactly a new idea for the Catholic Church, but it becomes a question of emphasis. How do you think he managed to emphasize that issue above some others?
Well, I think he did it by his own personal example, his simple living, his skewing signs of pomp and circumstance. You know, when he was elected pope, he paid his own bill at the hotel that he was staying at before the election, the church hotel. And he sought out the poor. And as you said, it's been nothing new as part of the Catholic Church. It was because we've been involved with the poor and the other pontiffs before him, as well. And remember John Paul II visiting Mother Teresa in Calcutta and walking with her in among the sick there. So yeah, you know, Jesus told us to preach the good news to the poor, and Pope Francis did it in a very admirable way.
I want to note something also that Jason DeRose said, the wording of something that Jason DeRose said just now. He talked about the 2024 election and Catholics who wanted to emphasize abortion in that election, and the pope said also pay attention to migrants, as well as abortion. He didn't say, pay attention to migrants instead. He said, pay attention to migrants also. How effective was he in reaching across the aisle, so to speak, in a very divided place like the United States?
Well, you know, politics is certainly polarized in the States and throughout the world right now. But, you know, Catholic social teaching teaches about the dignity of the human being. And I tell people the best way to summarize Catholic social teachings is to say that all those papal documents that are very oftentimes hard to understand because they're written in very philosophical terminology, but they can all be summarized in one sentence, that no human being is a problem. And so therefore, when we reduce people, when we engage in that reductive thinking that reduces people to problems, we give ourselves permission to look for solutions, as we saw in the 20th century, even final solutions.
So an unborn baby is not a problem, but a child that should be welcomed in life and protected by law, the migrant is not a problem. Immigration laws can be problematic, and they are broken in this country, to be sure. But the immigrant themselves is still a human being, a brother and sister, a stranger maybe, but someone which we embrace as a brother and sister. So I think that's the consistent ethic that the church is trying to teach and one that spans the whole gamut from all aspects of human dignity, from the most vulnerable.
On the last day of his life, he met with Vice President Vance, and they had had this public exchange of statements in which Vance said — spoke of concentric circles of concern that the family was more important than other people. And Francis replied and said, no, this is wrong. There aren't concentric circles of care. In about 30 seconds or so, what was Francis' view there? What was he saying as you understood it?
Well, I think, you know, he could agree with the vice president in saying that charity begins at home, but Pope Francis was also firm in insisting that charity does not stop at home.
