Francis. The Pope who walked with dust on his feet
- Pius Fozan
- 5 days ago
- 4 min read
Francis made people uneasy. Conservatives muttered about relativism. Liberals accused him of not going far enough. But he was never trying to be either.
I was writing my high school finals when the Vatican smoke turned white. Benedict had retired, an act unheard of in centuries, and a cardinal from Argentina emerged, quiet, almost shy. He stood on the balcony and said, “Buona sera.” I did not know then what that moment would mean, that this man, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, would choose the name Francis—not of a past pope, but of a saint who walked barefoot with lepers, preached to birds, and renounced wealth to be with the poor.
He was a Jesuit, the first to become Pope. The Roman Church had always looked at Jesuits with a certain side-eye: too intellectual, too independent, too political. But Francis was not trying to fit in. He never did. And he never would.
He wished for “a poor Church and a Church for the poor”—not as a slogan, but as a compass. It was clear in how he lived, in a guesthouse, not the opulent palace. In the battered shoes he refused to replace. In the way he carried his own briefcase.
He did not come to perform the papacy. He came to reform it.
Reforming the Roman Curia, the old boys' club of cardinals and power brokers, was, as he once said, “like cleaning the Sphinx of Egypt with a toothbrush.” He tried anyway. He launched financial audits. He reshuffled Vatican offices. He brought in lay experts. He knew the corruption, the decadence. He saw the rot, and still smiled. Still stayed. Still walked in.
His was a battle against an immovable structure, but it was a battle fought with integrity, conviction, and a belief that the Church could, and should change.
Francis made people uneasy. Conservatives muttered about relativism. Liberals accused him of not going far enough. But he was never trying to be either. He said, “Reality is greater than ideas.” And so, he walked with the wounded, sat with the dying, hugged refugees, wept for the Rohingya, washed the feet of Muslim prisoners, and reached across fences the world kept building.
“The presence of God today is called Rohingya,” he said, speaking about the Rohingya refugees who were suffering in Bangladesh.
When asked about gay priests, he replied, “Who am I to judge?” A sentence that shook centuries of judgment.
But Francis never abandoned doctrine. He held it in one hand and held the world’s wounds in the other. He believed in paradox, that the Church must speak truth, but first must listen. That a shepherd should smell like his sheep.
He appointed women, not as priests, but to high positions of power within the Vatican bureaucracy. He called for more roles for nuns, more recognition, more dignity. He was not afraid to laugh at the absurdity of tradition when it failed to see people.
His encyclicals read like love letters to the Earth and to the margins. Laudato Si’ and his 180-page encyclical on the environment were a howl against greed. He linked ecological devastation with economic injustice, calling it a “cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor.” He saw the connections, the systems, the sins behind them.
He spoke passionately of a world where economic and environmental justice were intertwined, where those at the periphery of society, migrants, refugees, the disenfranchised, were seen not as burdens, but as the embodiment of Christ.
Francis did not stop at words. His actions spoke to the deepening of this vision. He visited the island of Lampedusa, a site of tragedy for many migrants crossing the Mediterranean, and condemned Europe’s “indifference” to the deaths occurring in the waters. He took refugees from a Lesbos detention centre in Greece back to the Vatican with him, making the reality of their suffering something that the world could no longer ignore.
And yet, this very compassion was a source of contention. His stance on migration, his critique of laissez-faire capitalism that damages the planet, and his fervent appeal for solidarity with the poor brought him into conflict with political leaders like Donald Trump, Giorgia Meloni, and Viktor Orbán. On more than one occasion, Francis found himself at odds with those who weaponised Christian identity for nationalist and exclusionary purposes. He was not a conventional pontiff, tight-lipped.
He was a fierce critic of the regressive populism that sought to divide and conquer.
The last years and days of his papacy were marked by this tension. The Bishop of Rome continued to fiercely confront the evils of mass deportation policies in the United States, challenging political figures like J.D. Vance, whose pro-deportation stance he publicly criticised. He fought against the rise of right-wing populism, which often clashed with his vision of an inclusive, merciful world. He lamented the selfishness of the developed world, especially in how it handled the climate crisis, as he said, “No one is saved alone.”
He understood that solidarity was not just a moral call but a global necessity, that the destruction of the Earth would hit the poor hardest.
In many ways, Francis was not a pope for our certainties. He spoke in riddles. Refused binaries. Kept the mystery intact. That confused some. Infuriated others. But to many of us, it was a kind of grace. A space to breathe. To be.
And yet, like all prophets, he was also complicated. Near the end, he met with a figure he had long criticised—JD Vance. Men who stood for everything Francis warned against. It rattled me. I thought, Why would he offer his time to those who wound the poor, mock the migrant, turn the cross into a cudgel?
But Francis was Francis.
He believed no one was beyond grace, conversation. That even political cruelty did not forfeit mercy, humanity, and dialogue. Maybe that was his flaw. Or maybe that was his faith.
He was not perfect. He never pretended to be. He didn’t want sainthood. He wanted to walk.
And he did. Across borders and barricades. With migrants. With misfits. With mothers whose sons had drowned. With prisoners who sang. With clerics who doubted. With the dust of Assisi still on his feet.
