For U.S. Catholics, Pope Francis’ tenure defined by growing divisions

Pope Francis waves to the gathered crowds along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Sunday, Sept. 27, 2015, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

When Pope Francis visited the United States in 2015, cheering crowds of Catholics and non-Catholics turned out in New York, Washington and Philadelphia to greet him, lifting hopes that the U.S. church was about to enter a new, vibrant era.

It turned out to be a period of deep discord.

In the decade since that visit, an increasingly vocal and conservative segment of the U.S. church clashed with Francis over everything from immigration to climate change and same-sex couples. Over time, the conservative influence helped shape opinions of U.S. Catholics more broadly: About 75 per cent of U.S. Catholics viewed Francis favorably in 2024, down from a high of about 90 per cent in 2015.

Francis died at the age of 88 on Sunday.

The growing cultural and political sway of conservatives within the U.S. Catholic Church was underscored by the strong support for Donald Trump in last year’s presidential elections, despite hardline policies that conflicted with those of Francis.

Catholics voted for Trump 59 per cent-39 per cent over Democrat Kamala Harris, a 12 percentage point swing from 2020, according to exit polling by Edison Research.

Trump’s victory set up instances of conflict between the White House and the Vatican. Francis called Trump’s plans to deport millions of migrants a “disgrace,” and criticized his cuts to foreign aid and domestic welfare programs.

In a letter to American bishops, Francis also seemed to rebut the theological concept used by Vice President JD Vance, who became a Catholic in 2019, to justify the immigration crackdown.

Vance and Francis met briefly on Sunday, hours before the pope’s death in what the Vatican described as a cordial exchange of Easter greetings. Both Trump and Vance expressed condolences on Monday.

As Francis’ health deteriorated in his final weeks, some U.S. Catholics expressed admiration for the pope’s legacy, portraying his papacy as one of much-needed modernization.

“I know he gets a lot of hate for being more progressive,” said Carson Doss, 24, of New York. “Maybe it’s because I’m young but I don’t have a problem with it. My parents aren’t the biggest fans.”

U.S. church ‘an outlier’

David Gibson, director of Fordham University Center on Religion and Culture, a Catholic university in New York, described the growing traditionalism of the U.S. church as “an outlier within global Catholicism and increasingly so.”

According to experts, the traditional movement within the U.S. church - while not dominant in the pews - expanded its reach and influence through organizations such as Eternal Word Television Network, a Catholic broadcaster, and The Napa Institute, a group formed in 2010 that hosts conferences attended by clergy, business executives and political leaders, often focused on a conservative social agenda.

Those organizations and other conservative leaders at times took issue with the pope’s focus on topics such as climate change, while resisting his calls to limit Latin Mass, balking at approval of conditional blessings for same-sex couples, and bristling at his informal style.

Those sentiments were echoed by conservatives in the pews.

“I didn’t really like the Pope,” said Jeff Pfaff, 39, of New York’s Staten Island. Pfaff said he disagreed with Francis’ stance on U.S. immigration and allowing priests to perform same-sex marriage blessings.

“Don’t shove it down my throat,” he said, adding that he generally goes to church about three times a month.

Francis stocked the church leadership with cardinals from places that had never had them before, such as Tonga, Haiti and Mongolia, broadening representation beyond the Catholic church’s stronghold in Europe.

“They have a similar understanding of the church as Francis, a similar understanding of the mission, to care for the environment, care for migrants and refugees, and care for the excluded and the downtrodden,” said Tom Groome, a professor of theology at Boston College, a Catholic institution, cautioning, however, “they’re not all replicas of Francis.”

Conservative U.S. cardinals may align with similarly minded adherents of the faith from Africa during the conclave in hopes of choosing a conservative to succeed Francis, according to Massimo Faggioli, a professor of religious studies at Villanova University, a Catholic college in Pennsylvania.

The names of a few U.S. bishops have surfaced as possible contenders for Pope including Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, Archbishop Robert McElroy of Washington and Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago. All three were close to Francis, Faggioli said.

But a U.S. cardinal has never been elected pope, partly because the Vatican sees the U.S. as having outsized influence in the church, experts said.

Reporting by Jessica DiNapoli in New York; editing by Paul Thomasch and Suzanne Goldenberg