Pope Francis delivered a Sunday Angelus blessing from the window of his studio overlooking St. Peter’s Square on January 12, 2025 in Vatican City. (Photo: Vatican Media via Vatican Pool/Getty Images)
“Will the millions who will mourn his death these coming days respect this wish of his? Will they care for Gazans and Palestinians the way he did?”
The Vatican announced Monday that Pope Francis has died at the age of 88, hours after he appeared at an Easter mass and appealed for an end to Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip.
The pope’s Easter address, read aloud by Archbishop Diego Ravelli, decried the “terrible conflict” in Gaza that “continues to cause death and destruction and to create a dramatic and deplorable humanitarian situation.”
“I appeal to the warring parties: call a cease-fire, release the hostages, and come to the aid of a starving people that aspires to a future of peace!” said the message from the pope, an outspoken opponent of military conflict and war profiteers, climate destruction, and runaway economic inequality.
“In the face of the cruelty of conflicts that involve defenceless civilians and attack schools, hospitals, and humanitarian workers, we cannot allow ourselves to forget that it is not targets that are struck, but persons, each possessed of a soul and human dignity,” the pope’s address continued.
News of Pope Francis’ death came after a bout with double pneumonia left him hospitalized for more than a month. The Vatican did not specify a cause of death in its announcement.
The Nation‘s John Nichols wrote Sunday that Pope Francis’ calls for peace have made him “arguably the most consistent high-profile defender of the humanity of the Palestinian people during a period when the Israeli assault on Gaza has been pursued with relentless violence.”
Nichols continued:
With a boldness and specificity that has often sparked controversy, this pope has challenged economic injustice, racism, environmental neglect, militarism, and the abuses of new technologies that increase inequality. He has faced his share of criticism, not just from conservatives who disapprove of his views but also from reformers who sincerely wish that he would do more to modernize the church. Yet, in a time of too much indifference and impunity, this pope has remained uniquely engaged with the embattled regions that political and media elites neglect or abandon.
That’s been especially true when it comes to Gaza, where Pope Francis has long argued for cease-fires, arms blockades, aid convoys, and a diplomatic urgency that recognizes that Palestinians and Israelis are “fraternal peoples [who] have the right to live in peace.”
In a tribute to Pope Francis, Palestinian theologian Munther Isaac wrote Monday that “he conveyed true compassion to Palestinians, most notably to those in Gaza during this genocide.”
“The pope left our world today, and the occupation and the wall remained. Even worse, he left our world while a genocide continues to unfold,” Isaac wrote, pointing to the pontiff’s call for a thorough international investigation of Israel’s assault on Gaza.
“Today I wonder: Will the millions who will mourn his death these coming days respect this wish of his?” Isaac asked. “Will they care for Gazans and Palestinians the way he did?”
Pope Francis greeting people in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City in 2014. (Photo: Alfredo Borba/Creative Commons)
Again and again, Pope Francis railed against our collective indifference to widespread suffering and urged humanity, especially world leaders, to do better. It’s not too late to heed his call.
Like millions of other people, I was deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Pope Francis, one of the most vocal and humble advocates for sharing the world’s resources.
But at the heart of his advocacy was a focus on ending inequality both globally and on a national basis, repeatedly calling upon governments to redistribute wealth and benefits to the poor in a new spirit of generosity.
I first recall being struck by Pope Francis’ headline-grabbing speech in 2014, when he urged the United Nations to promote a ‘worldwide ethical mobilization’ of solidarity with the poor to help curb an ‘economy of exclusion’ that is taking hold everywhere today.
A year later in 2015, the papal encyclical Laudato Si’—subtitled ‘On care for our common home’—made bigger headlines around the world with its powerful critique of laissez-faire ideology and its destructive effects on the environment. The trenchant letter expounded on the responsibility of rich countries to address their ‘ecological debt’ to less developed countries, with an acknowledgement of ‘differentiated responsibilities’ in addressing climate change. It was a radical entreaty for resource transfers between the Global North and South, and significant reductions in the consumption of non-renewable energy within developed countries.
The eloquent discourse of Laudato Si’ also reflected the core understanding of many environmental activists—that the climate and inequality crises are inextricably interconnected. Again and again, Pope Francis railed against our collective indifference to widespread human suffering. He persistently argued that the welfare of nations is interrelated, so the massive poverty and hunger experienced in the fragile economies of developing nations is, in turn, reflected in the destruction of the natural environment. Hence the urgency of remediating the enormous discrepancies in living standards throughout the world, which calls for a sense of global solidarity and interdependency that is tragically lacking in human affairs.
During the coronavirus pandemic, Francis also set out the challenge for rich nations to cooperate and distribute the vaccine freely to the world, rather than hoarding resources and treating one’s own nation first. The 2020 encyclical titled Fratelli tutti—‘Brother’s all’—made clear that Covid-19 was exposing existing inequalities, and fraternity on a state level requires richer countries to help poorer ones if we are to give meaning to the equality of human rights. Clearly, the world failed to heed Pope Francis’ plea to ensure recovery from the crisis tackled poverty, inequality and the climate emergency by ‘sharing resources in a just and respectable manner’.
Another theme that Francis constantly returned to was the need for cancelling the debts of countries unable to repay them. In his final papal bull for the Jubilee Year 2025, titled Spes non confundit—‘Hope does not disappoint’—he described debt forgiveness as a matter of justice more than generosity, and again decried the true ecological debt that exists between the Global North and South.
Francis was rightly known as the ‘Pope of the peripheries,’ standing up for the most vulnerable and marginalized peoples. He made clear his opposition to Western government policies of battening down the hatches and draconian responses to international migrants. Soon after taking office, Francis visited the Italian island of Lampedusa where he condemned European ‘indifference’ to the drowning of migrants crossing the Mediterranean in small boats. He later visited numerous camps for excluded migrants and refugees living ‘ghost lives in limbo,’ calling upon us to see Christ in the stranger and outsider. This was a sharp rebuke to reactionary politicians like Trump, Meloni, and Orbán, instead emphasizing the need for ‘universal fraternity’ as influenced by St. Francis of Assisi, after whom the Pope took his name.
It was a fitting testament to Francis’ advocacy for the poor and forgotten that he died hours after calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. In his annual Urbi et Orbi —‘To the City and World’—message on Easter Sunday, the day before he died, Francis repeated his appeal to the warring parties to “come to the aid of a starving people that aspires to a future of peace.” Few politicians, it seems, have followed the Pope’s counsel throughout his 12-year-long pontificate. Which now leaves it up to us, the ordinary people of goodwill, to uphold Francis’ tireless advocacy and hope for a better world.
What makes Pope Francis and his 183-page encyclical so radical isn’t just his call to urgently tackle climate change. It’s the fact he openly and unashamedly goes against the grain of dominant social, economic and environment policies.
While the Argentina-born pope is a very humble person whose vision is of a “poor church for the poor”, he seems increasingly determined to play a central role on the world stage. Untainted by the realities of government and the greed of big business, he is perhaps the only major figure who can legitimately confront the world’s economic and political elites in the way he has.
However his radical message potentially puts him on a confrontation course with global powerbrokers and leaders of national governments, international institutions and multinational corporations.
The backlash has begun even before the encyclical has been officially published. US presidential candidate Jeb Bush, a Catholic, feels the pope should stay out of the climate debate, joining other Republicans, fossil fuel lobbyists and climate denier think-tanks in seeking to discredit Pope Francis’s intervention.
What makes the pope so radical?
There are several meanings of the word “radical” that can be applied to the Pope and in particular his forthcoming encyclical.
First, radical can be understood as going back to the roots (from Latin radix, root). The majority of Catholics live in the Global South; in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa. Francis is the first pope from the Global South, and naming himself in honour of Saint Francis of Assisi, “a man of poverty and peace who loved nature and animals”, signalled to the world a commitment to going back to the roots of human existence.
The pope knows the plight of the majority world. Before he became Archbishop of Buenos Aires, he was a priest in the vast, poor neighbourhoods, the villas miserias or slums, of Argentina’s capital.
Improving the lives of slum dwellers and addressing climate change is, for Pope Francis, one and the same thing. Both require tackling the structural, root causes of inequality, injustice, poverty and environmental degradation.
Even as the quality of available water is constantly diminishing, in some places there is a growing tendency, despite its scarcity, to privatize this resource, turning it into a commodity subject to the laws of the market. Yet access to safe drink- able water is a basic and universal human right, since it is essential to human survival and, as such, is a condition for the exercise of other human rights. (p. 23)
This stands in stark contrast to, for example, Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, the chairman of Nestlé, the world’s largest food and bottled water company, who thinks water is a normal commodity with a market value, and not a human right. Nestlé is far from unusual. Its stance is backed up by the official water privatisation policies of the World Bank, IMF and other international institutions.
In fact, the encyclical is a radical – for a pope and international leader, unprecedented – attack on the logic of the market and consumerism, which has been expanded into all spheres of life.
The document states:
Since the market tends to promote extreme consumerism in an effort to sell its products, people can easily get caught up in a whirlwind of needless buying and spending. Compulsive consumerism … leads people to believe that they are free as long as they have the supposed freedom to consume. But those really free are the minority who wield economic and financial power. (p. 149-150)
The pope rejects market fundamentalism, instead arguing that “the market alone does not ensure human development and social inclusion.”
The strategy of buying and selling “carbon credits” can lead to a new form of speculation which would not help reduce the emission of polluting gases worldwide. This system seems to provide a quick and easy solution under the guise of a certain commitment to the environment, but in no way does it allow for the radical change which present circumstances require. Rather, it may simply become a ploy which permits maintaining the excessive consumption of some countries and sectors. (p. 126)
The pope’s right. The same criticisms of carbon markets have been made by myself and others.
Climate change is a global problem with grave implications: environmental, social, economic, political and for the distribution of goods. It represents one of the principal challenges facing humanity in our day. (p. 20)
While the pope is not a politician – or maybe precisely because he is not one – he commands high moral and ethical authority that goes beyond traditional partisan lines. His encyclical speaks truth to power, and he might be the only person with both the clout and the desire to meaningfully deliver a message like this:
Many of those who possess more resources and economic or political power seem mostly to be concerned with masking the problems or concealing their symptoms, simply making efforts to reduce some of the negative impacts of climate change. However, many of these symptoms indicate that such effects will continue to worsen if we continue with current models of production and consumption. There is an urgent need to develop policies so that, in the next few years, the emission of carbon dioxide and other highly polluting gases can be drastically reduced, for example, substituting for fossil fuels and developing sources of renewable energy. (p. 21)
The bosses of Shell, ExxonMobil and other fossil fuel companies will not like this message, as it threatens their fundamental business model, and it also stands in contrast to the underwhelming ambitions of the G7 leaders who recently pledged to phase out fossil fuels only by 2100.
The time for bold, radical action on the environment as well as poverty eradication has come. This seems to be Pope Francis’ message: “The same mindset which stands in the way of making radical decisions to reverse the trend of global warming also stands in the way of achieving the goal of eliminating poverty.” (p. 128)
We need to think beyond the current, taken-for-granted logic that believes only markets and consumerism can solve the world’s social and environmental problems. The pope himself believes the situation is so grave that only a new, “true world political authority” will be able to address these problems.
This article was updated on 18 June to include quotes from the final encyclical rather than the earlier draft leaked to L’Espresso magazine.
Palestinian Catholics attend Christmas mass at Holy Family Church in Gaza City, Gaza, Palestine on December 24, 2024. (Photo: Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“I wish the war would end and we could return to our homes in peace,” said one little girl whose grandmother was killed by an Israeli sniper.
Palestinian Catholics attend Christmas mass at Holy Family Church in Gaza City, Gaza, Palestine on December 24, 2024.
(Photo: Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Another Somber Christmas in Palestine as Gaza Genocide Continues
“I wish the war would end and we could return to our homes in peace,” said one little girl whose grandmother was killed by an Israeli sniper.
From the illegally occupied “little town of Bethlehem” in the West Bank to a pair of churches in Gaza where Israel’s bombs and bullets have killed clerics and congregants alike, Palestinian Christians marked another somber Christmas amid a relentless Israeli assault whose victims on Wednesday included refugees sheltering in tents and medical staff and patients at a besieged hospital.
For the second year in a row, public Christmas celebrations were canceled at the Nativity Church in Bethlehem, which is built over the spot where Christians believe Jesus Christ was born.
“This should be a time of joy and celebration. But Bethlehem is a sad town in solidarity with our siblings in Gaza,” Lutheran Pastor Munther Isaac said during his Christmas sermon at a church whose nativity display again had baby Jesus lying in a pile of rubble.
“It’s hard to believe that another Christmas has come upon us and the genocide has not stopped,” Isaac added. “Decision-makers are content to let this continue. To them, Palestinians are dispensable.”
In Gaza, hundreds of Palestinian Christians huddled in two churches amid ongoing attacks by Israeli forces.
“This year, we will conduct our religious rites and that’s it,” Ramez Souri told The New York Times at the St. Porphyrius Greek Orthodox Church in Gaza City. “We’re still in mourning and far too sad to celebrate, or do anything except to pray for peace.”
Hundreds of Palestinians were sheltering on the grounds of the 12th century church—Gaza’s oldest—when Israeli forces bombed it in October 2023, killing 18 people including Souri’s three children and relatives of former Republican U.S. Congressman Justin Amash of Michigan.
In a pre-Christmas homily at Holy Family Church in Gaza City—Gaza’s only Catholic church— Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, told congregants, “You have become the light of our church in the entire world.”
“At Christmas, we celebrate the light and ask: Where is this light?” Pizzaballa continued. “The light is here, in this church.”
“I don’t know when or how this war will end, and every time we approach the end, it seems like we start anew,” he added. “But sooner or later, the war will end, and we must not lose hope. When the war ends, we will rebuild everything: our schools, our hospitals, and our homes. We must remain resilient and full of strength.”
Like St. Porphyrius, Holy Family has suffered a deadly Israeli attack. Last December, an Israeli sniper shot Nahida Khalil Anton, the elderly matriarch of the largest Catholic family in Gaza, as she crossed a courtyard in the church compound on her way to the bathroom. Her daughter Samar was shot in the head when she rushed out to try and help her mother.
Both women died. Seven other people were shot and wounded. Israeli soldiers and veterans have said that they were given permission and even orders to shoot anyone who moves in parts of Gaza.
"I wish the war would end and we could return to our homes in peace." A Christian Palestinian girl in Gaza wishes for peace on Christmas Day amid Israel's war, at the Holy Family Church in Gaza City.
On Sunday, Pope Francis—who in a new book called for a genocide investigation of Israel’s war on Gaza—said: “Yesterday, children have been bombed. This is cruelty; this is not war.”
The cruelty continued on Christmas as Israeli attacks throughout Gaza killed at least 13 people, according to officials. The dead include people sheltering in a tent northwest of Khan Younis, Palestine Red Crescent Society volunteer Alaa al-Derawi—who was shot in the chest while at work transporting patients—and Walaa al-Faranji, a well-known fashion designer, author, and photographer who was killed along with her husband Ahmed Salama in an airstrike on their home in the Nuseirat refugee camp.
Local media also reported continued Israeli shelling and attacks on Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia, where staff and scores of patients including premature babies have endured weeks of siege conditions.
All told, Gaza and international agencies say that at least 45,361 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and more than 107,800 others wounded by Israeli forces since the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023. At least 11,000 other Gazans are missing and believed to be dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings. Millions more Palestinians have been forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened.
Thousands more people have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees.
Israel is currently on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. Last month, the International Criminal Court, also based in The Hague, issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, as well as for Hamas leader Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Back at St. Porphyrius, parishioners pooled what little food they could find to prepare a communal Christmas Eve meal. Although many Gazan Christians have expressed fears that their community—one of the oldest Christian communities in the world—could be wiped out by Israel’s genocidal onslaught, the holiday meal represented a faint glimmer of hope.
“We wanted to do something to show that we’re still here,” Souri explained, “despite it all.”
