The appointment of Argentine Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the new pope could indicate a change in strategy for the Roman Catholic Church. After a conclave that lasted just two days, the Vatican elected the first non-European pope in more than 13 centuries. The selection of Bergoglio, who took the name Francis, was a surprise due to his nationality and because he was not discussed as a top candidate by the media in the weeks since the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI.
What is a Geopolitical Diary? George Friedman explains.
The cardinals who voted for Francis surely had demographic trends in mind when they chose the Argentine. Because of its Spanish and Portuguese colonial history, Latin America has the highest number of Catholics in the world. An estimated 483 million Catholics live in Latin American countries — 200 million more than in Europe. Moreover, some 50 million Hispanics live in the United States, most of whom are Catholic.
In addition, the markedly different birth rates in Europe and in Latin America make it likely that the gap in Catholic populations will continue to widen in the coming decades. Catholicism in Latin America is under threat by the expansion of evangelical churches and various Afro-Latin American creeds. Still, the selection of a Latin American pope confirms that the church has ceased to be a preeminently European institution and is seeking to strengthen its influence outside the Continent.
Another surprise is the new pope's religious background. Francis is a Jesuit — a member of one of the most reform-minded and outspoken orders of the Catholic Church. Founded by a religious leader named Ignatius of Loyola in 1540, the Society of Jesus was at the forefront of the expansion of the Catholic Church in the Americas and in Southeast Asia. The Jesuits have been characterized by two elements: their deep educational efforts — the order founded thousands of schools and universities around the world — and their active participation in politics. Because of the latter trait, the Society of Jesus often clashed with the European monarchies, to the point that the order was temporarily suppressed in the late 18th century.
The Catholic Church has played an important political role in Latin America for reasons that go beyond its number of adherents. When the majority of the region was under Spanish rule, the church was a cornerstone of social management and an important institutional counterpoint to the colonizers. More recently, in the 1950s and 1960s, a faction of the Catholic Church took an active political role in many countries of the region in a movement that became known as liberation theology.
A core feature of liberation theology is outspoken criticism of social injustice in Latin America, a position that has led many priests to criticize governments in the region — a large number of which have been dictatorships. This sort of activism led many governments to accuse advocates of liberation theology of flirting with Marxism (which in some cases was true, since some priests were members of groups such as the Sandinistas in Nicaragua), and some prominent priests were killed.
Though he has criticized liberation theology, Bergoglio has also been a constant critic of social inequalities in his native Argentina. This stance has led the Argentine church to clash on numerous occasions with the governments of former President Nestor Kirchner and his wife, President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. In keeping with the philosophy of his namesake, St. Francis of Assisi, Francis will likely be very vocal in denouncing inequalities. His choice of name was highly symbolic and undoubtedly intentional. This approach can be particularly controversial not only in Latin America but in Europe, where the economic crisis has led to record-high levels of unemployment in countries on the eurozone's periphery. As criticism of austerity measures grows in Europe, the new pope will likely align with the demands of the peripheral governments.
One of the biggest issues in Latin America where the Church could have real influence is violence. Some gangs in Mexico and Central America are actively religious, and the church could play a unique role in denouncing their violent tactics.
However, Francis is also close to the core of power in the church. The Argentine had a close relationship with his predecessor, and rumors suggest that Bergoglio finished in second place when Benedict XVI was elected in 2005. Moreover, Francis is 76 years old, and his health has recently been fragile. Consequently, his health will probably be a cause of constant concern to the Vatican, as was the case with Benedict XVI.
Benedict XVI's relatively short tenure marked a transitional period for the Catholic Church after the death of Pope John Paul II in 2005 — arguably the most geopolitically significant pope in modern history because of his prominent role in the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe. For his part, Francis faces the challenge of leading a church that is still physically and politically present around the world but the influence of which has been significantly diminished over the past century.
