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00:00Now joining me from Durham University in the UK is Professor Anna Rowlands, a specialist in
00:05Catholic social thought and practice. Thank you so much for your time, Professor. The world has
00:11changed significantly since Pope Francis was elected back in 2013. Inequality now seems even
00:18more firmly entrenched. We're witnessing the polarisation of global politics, the rise of
00:24social media and so on. And yet regardless, the pontiff remained committed to what he saw the
00:29very best of Catholic values, primarily justice for the poor. So I'm asking you, did he indeed
00:35leave his mark on the Catholic Church? Yes, I think he undoubtedly did. And I think
00:42what's extraordinary is, and in a sense your question just frames that really well, is that
00:47he had this capacity to speak into this moment, to see the big sort of meta trends that we're
00:53living with in geopolitical terms. So he talked about the way in which we're living in this
00:58moment of polarisation, where all of our crises that we're living with, ecological, migration,
01:04political and economic, are all interconnected. So he was able to name this in a way that was
01:10beautiful and clear to people so that they understood that. The guy you just interviewed
01:14in the square there was talking about the way in which he himself had absorbed that message.
01:19And yet he was also able to draw close to individuals, to feel, for people to feel that he was present
01:25to them. So somehow he managed that straddling of the naming of the signs of the times, if you like,
01:32and drawing people into a sense that they needed to feel in response to that, to be moved, as he
01:39talked about, have you wept with those who suffer? Are you willing to be close to the site of human
01:45suffering? And yet he himself was also able to make that personal human connection that was so central
01:50to how he saw the ministry of Jesus in the world. Yeah, others would argue, Professor Rowlands,
01:56that his papacy was one of contradictions, both for the Conservatives and the Progressives. He was
02:01resolutely against ordination of women priests and abortion rights, yet he seemed to open the door
02:07ever so slightly to LGBTQ plus individuals, but stopping short of embracing them fully. So in your opinion,
02:15what were his biggest achievements? And how did he overcome those contradictions, if indeed he did?
02:24Yeah, so in some, I think he himself would have said that those things were not necessarily
02:28contradictions. I think he held a strong doctrinal line. He didn't intend to change Catholic doctrine
02:34in its formal sense. But what he did want to do was humanise that doctrine and to draw people
02:40into a sense of the messiness and the complexity of real lives. He was unafraid of complexity,
02:47of conflict, of human fragility and weakness. And what he wanted to do was draw close to people
02:54and really to begin to listen more as a church to the realities of people's lives. So I think he felt
03:00that that drawing close to people whilst also holding a certain kind of doctrinal line was not in any way
03:06a contradiction. I do think that you're right that that meant that sometimes progressives felt
03:12disappointed that they wanted him to move forward with structural and doctrinal reform more quickly
03:16than he seemed willing to do. So he looked more conservative to them than perhaps they had
03:21initially thought he might be. Equally, conservatives found him frustrating, particularly on liturgical
03:27questions, the Latin mass, and they felt that he sort of mixed up doctrine in a way that appeared
03:33confusing to people because of his pastoral emphasis. I think both groups got him wrong
03:38in that regard. And I think there was an inherent consistency to the way in which he approached those
03:44questions. I think now he leaves a legacy for his successors in which he has opened up the church
03:51as a source of deep relevance and meaning of prophetic value to people in the world again. And he has
03:58enabled people to feel in his constant mantra of tuti, tuti, tuti, tuti, everyone, everyone, everyone,
04:04that there was a home and a place for people in the church. That's raised expectations about what the
04:09church can be for people in the next pontificate. And I think the legacy will be very much now down to
04:15the cardinals. Will they pick up that widening of the tent of the church? Will they pick up that need
04:21to be a listening church in humility alongside accompanying humanity? And will they be able
04:27to speak with the same kind of inner freedom that I think Pope Francis felt that he could speak with
04:33on major geopolitical and social issues? Those are the open questions, I think.
04:39And he certainly was the first papal leader to seek to address those sexual scandals that have plagued
04:45the Catholic church for decades, wasn't he? Well, I think that Pope Benedict would have thought that
04:52he was indeed doing that himself in some ways, but obviously the manner of his resignation and his sense
04:57of having failed to deal with the scale of that crisis was the very crisis that led to Pope Francis's
05:05election. So I think he felt that he was inheriting that as a major burden and responsibility for his time
05:11in office. And I think, again, that's been a kind of mixed legacy in the minds of many. I think he's
05:17acted in many ways in the right kind of ways on safeguarding issues. And yet there were abuse cases
05:25that he himself acknowledged that he got wrong. And I think, in fact, one of the areas in which he
05:30struggled most was perhaps cases that involved adult women being abused as opposed to children. And I think
05:36there's still a major journey for the way in which the Catholic church understands
05:40the full dimensions of the abuse question. And again, that will fall into the responsibility
05:47box of the next Pope. Just take us through what happens next and who's in charge at this critical
05:54time? Well, there are people with various roles at the moment. We saw the responsibilities
06:01yesterday evening for announcing formally the cause of death of the Pope and going through the rituals of
06:08sealing the room and the transfer of the body and so forth. There are obviously responsibilities now for the
06:13funeral that we know will take place on Saturday and then in turn for beginning to organise the conclave
06:20afterwards. So there are diverse responsibilities that sit on very different shoulders. But I think right now
06:27there's a sense of simply sort of gathering with expectation for those events on Saturday.
06:32Let's just take a pause there, Professor Roland, because obviously the big question now is who's going to replace
06:38Pope Francis at this critical moment? Is the church going to opt for a more progressive candidate or will a conservative person be chosen?
06:46And is this the time for the first pope from Asia or Africa? Catherine Viet takes a look at some of the men who could become the next pope.
06:55Who will succeed Francis as the next head of the Catholic Church? A few names are already being mentioned. First, the Vatican's Secretary of State, 70-year-old Pietro Parolin. He's an experienced diplomat and seen as a compromise candidate between progressives and conservatives.
07:15Another Italian, Matteo Maria Zuppi, the Archbishop of Bologna, is also a possibility. Like Francis, the 69-year-old cardinal is known for his social commitment to migrants and the poor and cares little about pomp and protocol.
07:32Outside Europe, there's Cardinal Sergio de Rocha from Brazil or Luis Antonio Tagli in the Philippines.
07:39They will enter a conclave in a few weeks. Men who come from Ulaanbaatar, Lesotho, East Timor. So truly from the four corners of the world with concerns that will not be those of the European heavyweights.
07:57It's not just where the next pope comes from, but also what direction that pope takes the church. Could the keys be given to another progressive?
08:05Jean-Marc Aveline, the Archbishop of Marseille, shares the same views on immigration and church relations with other religions as Francis.
08:15On the other hand, the College of Cardinals could choose a more conservative-leaning pope, like Robert Serrat shown on the left, or German Gerhard Müller.
08:24There's also politics at play.
08:26We must not underestimate the influence of the Catholic Church's very large financial sources, which can come also from the United States, from Africa and elsewhere, and which want to refocus the church.
08:42They want to get even with the pope, who wanted to decentralize his church, and who wanted a church that reflected the poorest and those who suffer.
08:53Whoever is selected, the choice of the future pope will send a strong signal in a context of growing tension within the church.
09:00I'm watching that report with me as Professor Anna Rowlands, a specialist in Catholic social thought and practice at Durham University in the UK.
09:10Professor, obviously you've got a sense there of the potential frontrunners, given that you're someone who's observed the church for some time.
09:17Who do you think will be the frontrunner?
09:20I think we have no clue at the moment, and that's not just a sort of diplomatic answer.
09:27I genuinely believe that this is going to be a conclave of surprises.
09:30And again, your package there touches on some of the reasons for that.
09:34Pope Francis appointed a huge number, over 100 of the cardinals he will be voting in the next conclave.
09:43And he appointed not necessarily the obvious candidates in terms of the sort of historical legacy of the various episcopal roles that would have expected a cardinal's hat to come with them.
09:54Instead, he moved to non-obvious candidates, and he moved much more to the peripheries.
09:59He moved to people who he thought had something really distinctive to offer, I think, to the next conclave and to the governance of the church.
10:06And that also means that there are more Africans, there are more Asians, and there are those in really interesting growing mission contexts.
10:14The church is in a moment of real contradiction, where there is significant growth and conversions in some parts of the church, and there are others that are in forms of decline.
10:24Although, interestingly, even Europe sees in the most recent figures that there is a kind of small revival in some sections of the church in the global north, including in Europe.
10:34So the question will be, who can be a uniting person, who can bridge those big intercultural differences to build a genuinely global Catholicism moving forwards?
10:45And I think this is a crucial part of what Pope Francis had in mind, that he himself wanted to de-centre the church from a more Eurocentric focus.
10:53And he wanted a church that truly represented the vibrancy of global Catholicism, and that's tipping the church towards the global south.
11:01Now, whether that means we'll have a pope immediately as a successor from the global south, who knows?
11:07But I think certainly it would have to be a figure who could speak to and understood deeply the realities of the African, Asian, Latin American contexts.
11:15And who really wanted to take forward that vision of mission that was at the heart of Pope Francis' vision?
11:21One of the reasons he focused so much on the option for the poor, on migrants, on those who were in situations of economic deprivation was really because he understood that this was the kind of missionary character of the church.
11:37It linked everything he did from his first teachings, his very obvious public gestures, to the results of the synod on synodality from this October, this last October, that the next pope will have to implement.
11:51So I think they're going to be really, who can bridge those, who can build the connections, and who can really continue the process of listening, engaging with,
12:01and tilting the power of the Catholic Church in a way that recognises the reality of the vibrancy of the global south.
12:08You mentioned there's some of the challenges facing his successor, but what are some of the other issues that this person is going to have to address?
12:16Yes, because it is an almighty job, isn't it?
12:19You know, particularly in a world where, you know, we've got issues regarding climate change, the rise of the far right, a lot of very many young people being somewhat disillusioned with the establishment in failing to address these critical issues.
12:35Yes, so I think it will need to be somebody who can pick up that legacy with confidence on speaking on the major social issues of our times.
12:44And again, one of the things that Pope Francis did so brilliantly was show these interconnections, will show that everything is connected in terms of our current crises.
12:53And I think the ability of somebody to continue with that legacy with confidence and speaking with freedom on those issues will be really important.
13:01But you raised the question of young people, which I think is a really interesting one, because on the one hand, we can argue that there's a legacy of faith not being passed down to that generation, of Catholic disaffiliation, as it were, particularly in Europe and the global north.
13:14But in fact, recent figures in Europe show that there is actually a degree of growth of interest in the church amongst young people and in active church attendance, particularly, interestingly, amongst young men.
13:28And I think that raises really interesting questions for us. There's a generation of younger men perhaps being attracted partly through the vision of Francis, but partly for other reasons as well, I suspect, to the Catholic Church at the moment, but not so much amongst their female counterparts.
13:43So young men, but fewer young women. So I think there's a real challenge there for the church, particularly in terms of the gender dynamics of what we see amongst those young people who might be interested in or actively disinterested in Catholicism.
13:56And that's very much my next question, because there is a global divide between young men and young women.
14:03And we're seeing that play out in politics as such. And obviously, it depends on who indeed will inherit the job.
14:12But women's issues, such as the issue of ordination of women priests and abortion rights, are still going to play a big factor, not forgetting that women do indeed make up 51% of the population.
14:25Yes. And I think this is one of the areas where Pope Francis had room for improvement.
14:33He himself would accept that there were limitations to his papacy.
14:37But I think one of the areas in which he thought genuinely that he was making real progress was on the inclusion of women, particularly in governance roles within church structures.
14:46So he appointed more women to top roles in the Vatican than any previous pope.
14:51And he spoke endlessly about his desire for women to feel that they were full participants and members of the Catholic Church and the respect that he felt for the role of women.
15:01However, he also tended to frame that theologically in a very particular way.
15:06He understood that there was almost a kind of strongly gendered difference in terms of the gifts that women and men brought into the life of the church and society.
15:15So he saw women more in terms of a kind of nurturing role.
15:19And they could be nurturing in governance roles, but he still saw that governance role in a more gendered way, in other words, layered with gendered meaning.
15:27And I think for some women that was quite off-putting, whereas for others it was perhaps more attractive.
15:31But certainly that was probably a polarising way of thinking about the engagement of women.
15:37So I think the next pope inherits the question of theologically, not just in terms of administration and giving out jobs and roles, but theologically, what will the Catholic Church want to say about the relationships between women and men and about gender in the coming decade or so?
15:55And I think that will be critical, not only for the life of the church itself and really pushing forward that thinking, but also, as you've just pointed out, because the politics of gender are very much shaping our wider politics and social conversation at the moment.
16:10So that contribution will be critical.
16:13Professor Owens, it's been a pleasure speaking to you. Thank you so much.