Mourning and Theological Maintenance Amid the Passing of the People’s Pope
There are many obstacles in modern Christianity, one of which is the question of how we are to love people well while still maintaining our theological perspectives. I see this most clearly in how Christians approach queer issues, but I think the passing of Pope Francis provides a useful, somewhat less controversial, lens to look at this fundamental question. It also has the added benefit of putting me in the rare position of navigating how to love despite my theological objections.
On April 21, 2025, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who was later known as Pope Francis, died following a stroke and heart attack. There were many disagreements I had with the Pope, and many I have with the institution of Catholicism. Perhaps most importantly, as an Anabaptist, I maintain the importance of adult, instead of infant, baptism and the priesthood of all believers that makes church structures unnecessary. I also value and endorse a personal relationship with God that does not require the confessional mediation of a priest on my behalf.
Despite these sincere and severe disagreements, I find myself mourning the death of Pope Francis and interested in the upcoming results of the Conclave. And, for many Christians, particularly in the US, this dichotomy might seem impossible. To put it in a more familiar phrase, how is it possible to love the sinner while hating their sin? To mourn someone while not affirming their lifestyle?
The principal principle we need to understand before moving forward is whether we, as Christians, are to value rightness or righteousness more. Rightness is the idea of being correct – holding, maintaining, and preaching accurate theological ideas. Righteousness is the idea of living correctly – adhering to God’s law and going about life in a Godly way. If we fail to take stock of which of these are most important, we will fail to even begin to understand how to love genuinely amid disagreement.
There are undoubtedly arguments for both sides being more important. In this way, the whole argument falls in on itself as, if both sides are faithfully using scripture, neither side can be wholly inaccurate. Indeed, there’s even an argument to be made that the argument itself is unbiblical. Rightness and righteousness are both important and in order to act righteously, you need to understand rightness.
Stepping back, though, there are two reasons why I think it’s important, even as a non-Catholic believer, to pay attention to the results of the Conclave and pray for God’s will to be done in the papacy.
First, it matters what kind of leader the Church has on a global stage. Even if we are not yoked under the Pope’s authority, it matters to us and to others if the person at the reigns of one of the most influential Christian denominations is more a Pharaoh, more of an Aaron, or more of a Moses. To be sure, all authorities are commissioned and ordained by God to fulfill God’s higher purposes in the world. However, it isn’t unbiblical to ask God to send us a Moses. Pharaoh enslaves, Aaron bends the knee to our distraction, and Moses encourages us to continually repent back towards God. Similarly to how I don’t long for a dictator to overtake a foreign country, I don’t want an enslaver or an unrighteous man to overtake a different denomination, even if I disagree with his position.
Second, we should be passionate about platforming people who follow Jesus well. Even if we disagree with them, theologically, an unbelieving world needs examples of people who live and love like Jesus. Pope Francis was someone like that. When he died, I had dozens of friends, almost all of whom were nonbelievers, DM me to ask who I thought would be the next pope, or to express their grief about a great man dying who made them consider rejoining a long forgotten faith. To me, this speaks of the testament of Francis’ life to an unbelieving world better than any sermon could.
Pope Francis lived a humble life: with little possessions, no servants, and a constant attention on those on the margins. I believe that Pope Francis lived a Christian life, even if we have different ideas on what it means to be a Christian. I hope that someday I have the courage to live as Francis did, committed to sharing an embodied gospel with a broken world, and not simply profess a right gospel with my lips. Therefore, I am forced to love Francis, the people’s pope, because I see the goodness and image of God in him, far deeper than my meager theological disagreements could reach.
Paul understood that, while both rightness and righteousness are important, living from a place of righteousness makes our rightness credible. He writes to the church in Corinth (13:1-3):
If I speak in the tongues of humans and of angels but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.
If we do or believe all the right things, but we do it without a rooting in God, we risk rendering our good deeds or right beliefs worthless.
For these reasons, even if you, like I, do not believe in the Catholic church, I invite you to pray for the catholic, or universal, church. I invite you to mourn Pope Francis with me and look eagerly to who ascends to the papacy next. Even if we don’t agree on every – or even anything – let’s agree to be people who love and live like Jesus, especially to those who do not know him, or just don’t know him yet. Let’s live like the people’s pope, and be passionate about sharing God’s love with the needy.
P.S. Get excited! Our new series starts soon and is called, “How To: A Series on (Mostly) Useless Skills.” In it, we’ll discuss some skills I’ve learned over my 28 years of life, including how to read more, how to deal with internet trolls, and how to eat well if you have no money.
NOTES:
Scripture quotations are taken from the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota, sells poetry art here, and masquerades as the spoken word artist Liihey. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page).
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