Francis (Ecc. Latin: Franciscus [franˈtʃiskus]; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio[b] on 17 December 1936) is the 266th and current pope of the Catholic Church, elected on 13 March 2013. As such, he is both head of the Church and Sovereign of the Vatican City State.
A native of Buenos Aires, Argentina, he was ordained as a priest in 1969. In 1998 he became the Archbishop of Buenos Aires, and in 2001 a cardinal. Following the resignation of his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, on 28 February 2013, the conclave elected Bergoglio, who chose the papal name Francisco in honour of Saint Francis of Assisi.[2] He is the first Jesuit pope, the first from the Americas, and the first from the Southern Hemisphere. Francis is the first pope born outside Europe in 1,272 years, since Syrian-born St. Gregory III.[3] Francis speaks Spanish, Latin, Italian,[4] German,[5] French,[4] and English.[6]
Early life
Jorge Mario Bergoglio was born in Buenos Aires, one of the five children of Mario José Bergoglio, a railway worker born in Portacomaro (Asti) in Italy's Piedmont region, and his wife Regina María Sivori, a housewife born in Buenos Aires to a family of northern Italian (Piedmontese-Genovese) origin.[7][8][9][10][11] Francis has been a supporter of the San Lorenzo de Almagro football club since his childhood.[12][13][14][15] As a teenager he had a girlfriend, Amalia, who has said that Bergoglio asked for her hand in marriage.[16][17][18][19][20] He graduated from the technical secondary school Escuelas Técnicas #27, Hipólito Yrigoyen,[21] and earned a degree as a chemical technician.[22] According to some sources, he earned a masters' degree in chemistry from the University of Buenos Aires.[23][24] At the age of 21, he decided to become a priest and began his religious studies and was eventually ordained in 1969.[21] He suffered from life-threatening pneumonia and cysts and had part of a lung removed shortly afterwards.[25]
Jesuit
Bergoglio entered the Society of Jesus on 11 March 1958 and studied to become a priest at the Jesuit seminary in Villa Devoto. In 1960, Bergoglio obtained a licentiate in philosophy from the Colegio Máximo San José in San Miguel; in 1964 and 1965, he taught literature and psychology at the Colegio de la Inmaculada, a high school in the Province of Santa Fe, Argentina, and in 1966 he taught the same courses at the Colegio del Salvador in Buenos Aires.[26]
In 1967, Bergoglio finished his theological studies and was ordained to the priesthood on 13 December 1969, by Archbishop Ramón José Castellano. He attended the Facultades de Filosofía y Teología de San Miguel (Philosophical and Theological Faculty of San Miguel),[27] a seminary in San Miguel, Buenos Aires province. Bergoglio attained the position of novice master there and became professor of theology.
The Society of Jesus promoted Bergoglio and he served as provincial for Argentina from 1973 to 1979.[28] He was transferred in 1980 to become the rector of the seminary in San Miguel, and served in that capacity until 1986. He spent several months at Sankt Georgen in Frankfurt, Germany, while considering possible dissertation topics[29] and returned to Argentina to serve as confessor and spiritual director to the Jesuit community in Córdoba.[30] In Germany he saw the painting Mary Untier of Knots in Augsburg and brought a copy of the painting to Argentina where it has become an important Marian devotion.[31] According to Regina Novaes of the Institute of Religious Studies in Rio de Janeiro, this devotion "attracts people with small problems".[32] He had an image of Mary Untier of Knots inscribed on a chalice he presented to Pope Benedict XVI in 2005.[33]
| Ordination History of Pope Francis |
| Priestly ordination |
| Ordained by |
Ramón José Castellano |
| Date of ordination |
13 December 1969 |
| Episcopal consecration |
| Principal consecrator |
Antonio Quarracino |
| Date of consecration |
27 June 1992 |
| Cardinalate |
| Date elevated to cardinal |
21 February 2001 |
Bishop
Bergoglio was named Auxiliary Bishop of Buenos Aires in 1992 and was ordained on 27 June 1992 as Titular Bishop of Auca,[34] with Cardinal Antonio Quarracino, Archbishop of Buenos Aires, serving as principal consecrator.[citation needed]
Bergoglio succeeded Cardinal Quarracino as Archbishop of Buenos Aires on 28 February 1998 and was concurrently named ordinary for Eastern Catholics in Argentina, who had lacked their own prelate.[citation needed]
Cardinal
At the consistory of 21 February 2001, Archbishop Bergoglio was created a cardinal by Pope John Paul II with the title of cardinal-priest of San Roberto Bellarmino. As cardinal, Bergoglio was appointed to five administrative positions in the Roman Curia:
That fall, when Cardinal Edward Egan returned to New York following the September 11 attacks, Bergoglio replaced him as relator (recording secretary) in the Synod of Bishops and, according to the Catholic Herald, created "a favourable impression as a man open to communion and dialogue".[35][36]
Cardinal Bergoglio became known for personal humility, doctrinal conservatism and a commitment to social justice.[37] A simple lifestyle contributed to his reputation for humility. He lived in a small apartment, rather than in the palatial bishop's residence. He gave up his chauffeured limousine in favor of public transportation[38] and cooked his own meals.[39]
On the death of Pope John Paul II, Bergoglio was considered one of the papabile cardinals.[40] He participated as a cardinal elector in the 2005 papal conclave that elected Pope Benedict XVI. Catholic journalist John L. Allen, Jr. reported that Bergoglio was a frontrunner in the 2005 Conclave.[41][37] An unauthorized diary of uncertain authenticity released in September 2005[42] confirmed that Bergoglio was the runner-up and main challenger of Cardinal Ratzinger at that conclave. The purported diary of the anonymous cardinal claimed Bergoglio received 40 votes in the third ballot, but fell back to 26 at the fourth and decisive ballot.[43] La Stampa reported that Bergoglio was in close contention with Ratzinger during the election, until he made an emotional plea that the cardinals should not vote for him.[44] Earlier, he had participated in the funeral of Pope John Paul II and acted as a regent alongside the College of Cardinals, governing the Holy See and the Roman Catholic Church during the interregnum sede vacante period.
During the 2005 Synod of Bishops, he was elected a member of the post-synodal council. On 8 November 2005, Bergoglio was elected president of the Argentine Episcopal Conference for a three-year term (2005–08) by a large majority of the Argentine bishops. He was reelected on 11 November 2008.
In 2007, just two days after Benedict XVI issued Summorum Pontificum, Cardinal Bergoglio was one of the first bishops in the world to respond by instituting a Tridentine mass in Buenos Aires.[45][46] It was celebrated weekly.[47]
As a cardinal, Bergoglio was associated with Communion and Liberation, a conservative Catholic association of the faithful.[37]
In Argentina, initial opinion following the election was divided; some support Bergoglio and admire his austere lifestyle, while others disapprove of his opposition to issues like same-sex marriage and are uneasy about his supposed ties to the country's oppressive military dictatorship in the 1970s.[48][35][49][50] However Adolfo Pérez Esquivel has stated that Bergoglio had no connection with the 1976-1983 Regime in Argentina.[51]
Relations with the Argentine government
As provincial
Bergoglio has been the subject of allegations regarding the kidnapping of two priests by the military during Argentina's Dirty War in 1976, whom he had dismissed just prior to their disappearance due to their antigovernment views. These were the subject of a court case in 2005 that was ultimately dismissed, but the episode continues to be a matter of debate, with different accounts of the events being put forth.[52] In 2005, a human rights lawyer filed a criminal complaint against Bergoglio, as superior in the Society of Jesus of Argentina, accusing him of involvement in the kidnapping by the Navy in May 1976 of the two Jesuit priests.[53] The priests, Orlando Yorio and Franz Jalics, were tortured,[54] but found alive five months later, drugged and semi-naked. Yorio accused Bergoglio of effectively handing them over to the death squads by declining to tell the regime that he endorsed their work. Jalics refused to discuss the complaint after moving into seclusion in a German monastery.[55] The complaint did not specify the nature of Bergoglio's alleged involvement, and Bergoglio's spokesman flatly denied the allegations. Under Argentine law such accusations can be made on little evidence, to be investigated by a court,[53] and the lawsuit was ultimately dismissed.[52]
Horacio Verbitsky, an Argentine investigative journalist and former montonero guerilla, wrote a book about this and other related events titled El Silencio: de Paulo VI a Bergoglio: las relaciones secretas de la Iglesia con la ESMA.[56] According to the book, after their release Yorio accused Bergoglio, then-Provincial of his San Miguel Jesuit order, of having denounced him. "Bergoglio withdrew his order's protection of the two men after they refused to quit visiting the slums, which ultimately paved the way for their capture."[25] Jesuit Father General Pedro Arrupe in Rome was informed by letter during the abduction. Both Jalics and Orlando Yorio were excluded from the Jesuit Order.[57]
Bergoglio told his authorized biographer, Sergio Rubin, that after the priests' imprisonment he worked behind the scenes for their release; Bergoglio's intercession with dictator Jorge Rafael Videla on their behalf may have saved their lives.[58] "The [now] cardinal could not justify why these two priests were in a state of helplessness and exposed," according to Luis Zamora, who said that Bergoglio's testimony "demonstrates the role of the Church during the last military dictatorship".[59] In 2010, Bergoglio told Sergio Rubin that he had often sheltered people from the dictatorship on church property, and once gave his own identity papers to a man who looked like him, so he could flee Argentina.[54]
Human rights attorney Myriam Bregma claims Bergoglio endorsed the dictators when he knew they were torturing and killing Argentinians and claims “this key support” enabled the junta to operate that way. It is claimed Bergoglio knew at least one case when a woman five months pregnant in the De la Cuadra family was kidnapped, she gave birth in captivity, the baby was stolen and given to another family. A monsignor allegedly brought Bergoglio a written note saying the baby was with a family too important for the adoption to be reversed. In 2010 Bergoglio claimed not to have known about stolen babies during the dictatorship despite his alleged personal knowledge of this case.[60]
"Bergoglio has a very cowardly attitude when it comes to something so terrible as the theft of babies. He says he didn't know anything about it until 1985," said the baby's aunt, Estela de la Cuadra, whose mother Alicia co-founded the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo in 1977 in hopes of identifying these babies. "He doesn't face this reality and it doesn't bother him. The question is how to save his name, save himself. But he can't keep these allegations from reaching the public. The people know how he is." [60]
The artist and human rights activist Adolfo Perez Esquivel, who won the Nobel peace prize in 1980, contradicted this, stating: "Perhaps he didn't have the courage of other priests, but he never collaborated with the dictatorship [...] Bergoglio was no accomplice of the dictatorship." Estela de la Cuadra feels Borgoglio's denial that he knew about babies born in concentration camps being adopted amounts to "lies and hypocrisy". Estela de la Cuadra wants the Vatican to release documents which could shed light on what really happened but this is unlikely. [61]
According to La Razon, a newspaper of the Argentine capital city of Buenos Aires, the government has the strategy of discrediting Bergoglio due to his staunch criticism against the President and her spouse, by falsely associating him with the military dictatorship. Giving several examples of the government's attempt, La Razon reported that the government used a photo of another priest to accuse Bergoglio of giving communion to a senior officer of the military dictatorship.[62]
After becoming bishop
Néstor Kirchner was elected president of Argentina in 2003, and attended the 2004 mass of Bergoglio at the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral during the First National Government national day of Argentina. Bergoglio requested more political dialogue, rejected the intolerance, and criticized the exhibitionism and strident announcements.[63] As a result, Kirchner did not attend the mass the following year, and celebrated the national day elsewhere; the mass in the Cathedral was suspended.[64] Kirchner considered Bergoglio a political rival since then.[65] The relations stayed tense with Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, wife of Néstor Kirchner, who was elected president in 2007. He called for national peace during the 2008 Argentine government conflict with the agricultural sector, which was interpreted by the government as a support to the demonstrators.[65] The sanction of the same-sex marriage law was a particularly tense moment of their relation.[65]
Relations with other religious groups
Bergoglio has close ties to the Jewish community of Argentina, and attended Jewish Rosh Hashanah services in 2007 at a synagogue in Buenos Aires.[66] The Catholic Zenit News Agency reported that Bergoglio told the Jewish congregation during his visit that he went to the synagogue to examine his heart, "like a pilgrim, together with you, my elder brothers."[66]
After the 1994 bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) building in that city, which killed 85 people, Bergoglio was the first "public personality" to sign a petition condemning the attack and calling for justice.[66] Leaders of the Jewish community around the world, not just in Argentina, noted that his words and actions "showed solidarity with the Jewish community" in the aftermath of this attack.[66]
A former head of the World Jewish Congress, Israel Singer, reported that he worked with Bergoglio in the early 2000s, distributing aid to the poor as part of a joint Jewish-Catholic program called "Tzedaka".[66] Singer notes that he was impressed with Bergoglio's modesty, remembering that "if everyone sat in chairs with handles [arms], he would sit in the one without."[66] Bergoglio's numerous other actions in support of the Jewish community included his co-hosting a Kristallnacht memorial ceremony at the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral in 2012.[66]
Leaders of the Islamic community in Buenos Aires welcomed the news of Bergoglio's election as pope, noting that he was always a "friend of the Islamic community," and a person whose position is "pro-dialogue."[67]
Bergoglio visited both a mosque and a school in Argentina, visits that Sheik Mohsen Ali, the Director for the Diffusion of Islam, called actions that strengthened the relationship between the Catholic and Islamic communities.[67] Dr. Sumer Noufouri, Secretary General of the Islamic Center of the Republic of Argentina (CIRA), added that Bergoglio's past actions make his election as pope a cause within the Islamic community of "joy and expectation of strengthening dialogue between religions."[67] Noufouri said that the relationship between CIRA and Bergoglio over the course of a decade had helped to build up Christian-Muslim dialogue in a way that was "really significant in the history of monotheistic relations in Argentina."[67]
Papacy
Bergoglio was elected pope on 13 March 2013,[68][69] the second day of the 2013 papal conclave, taking the papal name Francis.[70] Vatican deputy spokesman Thomas Rosica said the same day that the new pontiff had chosen the name in honor of Saint Francis of Assisi, and had done so because the new pontiff was a lover of the poor.[71][72][73] Some initially thought that, as a Jesuit, he chose Francis in recognition of Francis Xavier, the co-founder of the Society of Jesus.[74][75] This is the the first time that a pope has been named "Francis"[76] and the first time since Pope Lando's brief 913 reign that a serving pope held a name unused by a predecessor[77] (though the dual name John Paul had not been used before Pope John Paul I adopted it in 1978, the names had separately been used previously).
Health
Pope Francis, elected at the age of 76, is reported to be in good health due to his austere and healthy lifestyle. In 1969, shortly after becoming a priest, Bergoglio had life-threatening pneumonia, and three cysts. According to an interview he had with his biographers, he was between life and death for three days, and had the upper part of his right lung removed. [78] Doctors say that his missing lung tissue does not have a significant impact on his health. The only concern would be decreased respiratory reserve if he had a respiratory infection.[79]
Positions on social and political issues
Poverty and economic inequality
At a meeting of Latin American bishops in 2007 Bergoglio said "[w]e live in the most unequal part of the world, which has grown the most, yet reduced misery the least" and that "[t]he unjust distribution of goods persists, creating a situation of social sin that cries out to Heaven and limits the possibilities of a fuller life for so many of our brothers".[80] On 30 September 2009, Bergoglio spoke at a conference organized by the Argentina City Postgraduate School (EPOCA) at the Alvear Palace Hotel titled "Las deudas sociales de nuestro tiempo" ("The Social Debts of Our Time") in which he quoted the 1992 "Documento de Santo Domingo"[81] by the Latin American Episcopal Conference, saying "extreme poverty and unjust economic structures that cause great inequalities" are violations of human rights.[82][83] He went on to describe social debt as "immoral, unjust and illegitimate."[84]
During a 48-hour public servant strike in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Bergoglio observed the differences between "poor people who are persecuted for demanding work, and rich people who are applauded for fleeing from justice".[85] In 2002, during an economic crisis, Bergoglio harshly criticized those in power, saying, "Let's not tolerate the sad spectacle of those who no longer know how to lie and contradict themselves to hold onto their privileges, their rapaciousness, and their ill-earned wealth."[86] During a May 2010 speech in Argentina regarding the poor, he directed his message to the wealthy by saying: "You avoid taking into account the poor. We have no right to duck down, to lower the arms carried by those in despair. We must reclaim the memory of our country who has a mother, recover the memory of our Mother".[87] In 2011, Bergoglio stated: "There is a daily anesthesia that this city knows how to use very well, and it is called bribery, and with this anesthesia the conscience is numbed. Buenos Aires is a bribe-taking city."[88]
In 2011, Bergoglio decried sweatshops and homelessness in Buenos Aires as forms of slavery, saying "In this city, slavery is the order of the day in various forms, in this city workers are exploited in sweatshops and, if immigrants, are deprived of the opportunity to get out. In this city, there are kids on the streets for years." He added, "The city failed and continues to fail in the attempt to free them from this structural slavery that is homelessness."[88]
In line with the Catholic Church's efforts to care for AIDS victims, he is well remembered for his 2001 visit to a hospice, in which he washed and kissed the feet of 12 AIDS patients.[89]
Aparecida Document and human rights
In 2007, as Cardinal Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Bergoglio presented the final version of a joint statement of the bishops of Latin America – the "Aparecida Document" – upon its approval by Pope Benedict XVI. Bergoglio denounced what he characterized as a cultural tolerance of child abuse. He spoke strongly against the abuse of children as "demographic terrorism" and decried their exploitation. "Children are mistreated, and are not educated or fed. Many are made into prostitutes and exploited".[90] In 2011, Bergoglio condemned child trafficking and sex slavery in Buenos Aires, saying "In this city, there are many girls who stop playing with dolls to enter the dump of a brothel because they were stolen, sold, betrayed." "In this city, women and girls are kidnapped, and they are subjected to use and abuse of their body; they are destroyed in their dignity. The flesh that Jesus assumed and died for is worth less than the flesh of a pet. A dog is cared for better than these slaves of ours, who are kicked, who are broken."[88]
Bergoglio also encouraged his clergy and laity to oppose both abortion and euthanasia, describing the pro-choice movement as a "culture of death",[91] and had opposed the free distribution of contraceptives in Argentina.[92] The document links worthiness to receive the Eucharist to compliance and acceptance of Church teaching against abortion and euthanasia:[90][93][94][95]
- "We hope that legislators, heads of government, and health professionals, conscious of the dignity of human life and of the rootedness of the family in our peoples, will defend and protect it from the abominable crimes of abortion and euthanasia; that is their responsibility ... We should commit ourselves to 'eucharistic coherence', that is, we should be conscious that people cannot receive Holy Communion and at the same time act or speak against the commandments, in particular when abortion, euthanasia, and other serious crimes against life and family are facilitated. This responsibility applies particularly to legislators, governors, and health professionals."
He further denounced a "culture of discarding" the elderly and treating them as if they are disposable and worthless due to their advanced age.[90]
Same-sex marriage
Bergoglio has affirmed the Church's teaching of homosexual practices being intrinsically immoral, yet clarified that "men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies must be accepted with respect and compassion."[96][97] The Church has stated that homosexual desires or attractions are not themselves sinful.
He opposes same-sex marriage,[98] and unsuccessfully opposed legislation introduced in 2010 to legalize same-sex marriage in Argentina, calling it a "real and dire anthropological throwback".[99] In July 2010, while the law was under consideration, he wrote a letter to Argentina's cloistered nuns in which he said:[100][101][102]
In the coming weeks, the Argentine people will face a situation whose outcome can seriously harm the family…At stake is the identity and survival of the family: father, mother and children. At stake are the lives of many children who will be discriminated against in advance, and deprived of their human development given by a father and a mother and willed by God. At stake is the total rejection of God's law engraved in our hearts.
Let's not be naive: This is not a simple political fight; it is a destructive proposal to God's plan. This is not a mere legislative proposal (that's just its form), but a move by the father of lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God… Let's look to St. Joseph, Mary, and the Child to ask fervently that they defend the Argentine family in this moment... May they support, defend, and accompany us in this war of God.
After L'Osservatore Romano reported this, several priests expressed their support for the law and one was defrocked.[101] Observers believe that the church's opposition and Bergoglio's language, which has been criticized by politicians[103] worked in favor of the law's passage and that Roman Catholic officials learned from their failed campaign against the same-sex marriage law to adopt a different tone in later debates on social issues such as parental surrogacy.[104][105] | 
