The most controversial pontiff in living memory has just died at the age of 88.
Pope Francis – born in Argentina as Jorge Mario Bergoglio — passed away after a lengthy battle with thrombocytopenia blood disorder, a mild acute kidney injury, and renal insufficiency.
Like a Greek tragedy, Francis will be remembered as the pontiff who radiated a utopian vision of unifying the world under Friedrich Schiller’s rousing call of fratelli tutti (brothers all) — but left his own church fatally fractured.
Ironically, Francis hated President Donald Trump, but was himself a toweringly “Trumpian” personality — one people either loved or hated.
Millions of Catholics around the globe revered him as a prophet of mercy, an apostle of peace, and a spartan workaholic who rejected the pomp of the papal palace, choosing to live in the Santa Marta hostel instead.
They hailed his unflinching emphasis on social justice, equality, immigration, climate change, ecumenical outreach, interfaith dialogue, the decentralization of power, and his far-sighted chess maneuvers to include the marginalized, especially women, in the highest echelons of the church.
But his critics saw him as a Screwtape-like character in a white zucchetto — a Marxist wrecking ball scheming to dilute and eventually dissolve distinctive Catholic doctrine by turning the glittering wine of Catholicism into the tepid water of a bland Anglicanism.
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