And how the church can accompany couples struggling with infertility

Francis always encouraged me in our attempt to move forward as an ecumenical community and in welcoming young people from different churches who come to Taizé from all over the world. He was the pope, but also a father and a brother to me.

Pope Francis centered the poor and elevated joy in the mission of the church. These characteristics help us understand what a field hospital church is about. As a field hospital, the church’s structures and actions should always be in service of its mission.

“Pope Francis entered the papacy as a Jesuit, governed as one and died as one,” Father James Martin writes.

When the cardinals voted to elect Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the 265th successor of St. Peter on the evening of March 13, 2013, few of them imagined what kind of pope he would be.

We need a healthier public square in which people of all backgrounds can work together.