How Pope Francis made history and reshaped the church in his 12-year papacy

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• Amna Nawaz:

  And for some more perspective on the life and legacy of Pope Francis, we turn now to Reverend Thomas Reese, senior analyst for Religion News Service and author of "Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church."

  Father Reese, welcome back to the "News Hour." Thanks for joining us.

• Rev. Thomas Reese, Religion News Service:

  Good to be with you.

• Amna Nawaz:

  So, Francis was a lot of firsts, as we just heard there, the first Jesuit pope, the first Latin American pope, the first non-European pope and more than a millennium. How did all of those firsts translate into his world view and how he led, what he sought to do with his time in the papacy?

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  Well, I think his background really helped shape his papacy. Coming from the Global South, of course, he was very interested in issues of justice and peace. He was really concerned about the impact of globalization poor people around the world. He was concerned about migrants and refugees that had to flee from war zones and poverty in the Global South.

  And he was very concerned about how they were treated when they came north. So these are the kinds of things that had an impact on him that came from his personal background of coming from the Global South itself.

• Amna Nawaz:

  He was seen by many as progressive to some degree, but it's fair to say that even many liberals were disappointed that he didn't break from previous stances of the church on things like abortion and birth control or women joining the clergy.

  In a column today, though, you called him revolutionary in every other way. How so?

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  Well, I think that's true. He didn't change any doctrine, but he certainly changed the culture of the church. He hated clericalism. He told bishops and priests not to act like princes, but to get down with their people and listen to them and care for them.

  He also was very happy with having debate and discussion in the church. That may have come from his Jesuit background, because, in the previous papacies, if you didn't agree with the pope, you were silenced. You could lose your job teaching in a seminary. But he welcomed discussion. He was not afraid of having that kind of open discussion, because he felt that that was the way the church grew.

• Amna Nawaz:

  He also stepped into the role just as the Vatican was in a bit of disarray after Pope Benedict had stepped down, who was the real standard-bearer of Roman Catholic conservatism.

  And Pope Francis really sought to steer the church in a completely different direction. How did that resonate with the rank and file, with Catholics around the world?

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  Well, Pope Francis and Pope Benedict were very different people. Pope Benedict, of course, was an academic. He was a scholar, a writer of books and a very complex theology.

  Pope Francis was a pastor. He liked to be with the people. He liked to communicate in words that people could understand, not just scholars. He was able to reach out and touch people in a way that I think had not been done for a long time. And that kind of pastoral approach, that compassionate approach was something that people found very attractive in him.

• Amna Nawaz:

  When it comes to, of course, the sexual abuse scandal that the church was dealing with as well, after he had some early missteps, Pope Francis really took bigger swings, looking for accountability and trying to build back some of that trust that had been lost.

  In your view, how did he do on that front? Was he able to build that back?

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  Nobody in the church has been perfect on dealing with the sex abuse crisis. There was a lot of ignorance. There was a lot of stupidity.

  And — but I think Pope Francis learned during his papacy. For example, he went to Chile and just blew it. I mean, he just did not get it. He didn't believe the accusations that were being made. It's like somebody makes accusations against your brother or your uncle. You find it incomprehensible.

  But then, when he found out it was true, boy, did he get mad. And he made all of the bishops in Chile submit their resignations. He didn't accept them all, but he accepted some of them. And he started going after bishops and saying, you protect your children or you're out.

  And so that became a new tone in the Catholic Church, which I think was very helpful.

• Amna Nawaz:

  He did have his conservative critics, and he demoted many of them in Vatican leadership and restricted the use of the old Latin mass.

  Are those conservative forces now pushing for a return to that more traditional view?

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  Yes, there are conservative factions within the church that are pushing to go back to before the Second Vatican Council, to go back to the old church.

  They're a small minority. They're — some of the elites, conservative elites, are very vocal and very loud in their criticism of Pope Francis. But if you look at the public opinion polls, 75 percent of Catholics have a favorable view of Pope Francis. Even Republican Catholics, almost two-thirds of them have a favorable view of Pope Francis.

  I think that this is a minority view and his legacy will endure.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Well, the demographics of the church have certainly changed quite a bit. There are nearly 1.5 billion Catholics in the world. Roughly 80 percent of them are outside of Europe, about half in the America's, 20 percent in Africa, 10 percent in Asia.

  What does that mean for the future of the church and for what the next pope will inherit?

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  Well, the word Catholic itself means universal. We are a big tent church. We have people from all cultures, all languages, all areas of the world where there are Catholics.

  So this means that we have to learn how to speak and how to live together. The Catholic Church should be a model for the rest of society of how people can come together, how they can discern and pray and talk and have conversation and not scream at each other, let alone kill each other.

  The great thing that Pope Francis tried to do with other religious leaders was make religion a force for reconciliation and peace in the world. And I think we can do that because the Catholic Church is present everywhere in the world.

• Amna Nawaz:

  That is the Reverend Thomas Reese of Religion News Service joining us tonight.

  Father Reese, always a pleasure to speak with you. Thank you so much.

• Rev. Thomas Reese:

  You're welcome. Thank you.