COMMENTARY: Since taking office in May, the Holy Father has served the Church more as a stabilizer than a disruptor.
 

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On Aug. 16, Leo XIV marks his first 100 days as pope, enjoying enormous goodwill in the world and in the Church. That was evident from the exuberant reception he received at the Jubilee of Youth in Rome.

The Holy Father likely considers that goodwill itself a good thing, a time of comity and comfort in the Church. It may not last, but as long as it does, it is a blessing to be enjoyed. To that end, the first hundred days have been marked by steadiness in style and delayed decision-making.

The style was commented upon from the beginning; Catholic schoolchildren who wouldn’t know a mozzetta cape from mozzarella cheese were excitedly informed that Pope Leo had worn what Pope Francis refused to wear. Steadiness in style gives a sort of comfort, that things are as they should be. That Pope Leo is doing normal papal things — wearing what popes should wear, living where popes should live, even restoring John Paul II-era customs, like the Corpus Christi procession and the pallium Mass on June 29 — has no real significance.

Popes doing normal pope things is, well, normal. But it does indicate that Leo is willing to conform his person to the Petrine office. 

“Jorge Bergoglio is dead,” I recall the late Cardinal Francis George saying soon after the conclave of 2013. “It is now Pope Francis who lives.” Another bishop of my acquaintance put it more bluntly: “Less Jorge. More Peter.”

Pope Leo has indicated by his style and comportment an understanding of that. Toward the end of the Francis pontificate — finally symbolized by his impromptu and infirm appearance in St. Peter’s Basilica wearing black trousers and wrapped in a striped blanket — there was a sense that the personal idiosyncrasies of the Pope, however endearing they once might have been, had run their course. Pope Leo seems to agree that the Church needs less Robert, more Peter.

A biography of Pope Francis published last year was entitled The Jesuit Disruptor. To whatever extent it was good for the Church to have a disruptor, rather than a stabilizer, as universal pastor, early signs indicate that disruption is not what Leo intends to offer.

That doesn’t mean that Leo is only a copy of others, without his distinctive personality. His video call with astronaut Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin on July 20 — the anniversary of the 1969 lunar landing — revealed that in Leo remains something of the teenage Robert Prevost who, like millions of other American teenage boys, looked up at the sky in 1969 and looked up to the astronauts they considered heroes. 

The Aldrin call was handled with characteristic steadiness. It was not done spur-of-the-moment on the Pope’s personal mobile phone, but decorously arranged ahead of time, and the media were informed in a timely and complete fashion, not having to rely on insiders leaking the story. If there is going to be endearing informality under Leo, it will be formally arranged. 

On July 29, welcoming “digital missionaries and influencers” in the morning and young pilgrims in the evening, Pope Leo spoke with them with great ease in three languages — Italian, English and Spanish. Having a pope who can easily converse in the two most-spoken languages in the Catholic world — English and Spanish — is a major advantage. 

Style is of great importance in a pastor, as it provides the framework in which his governance and teaching will be received. Papal protocols assist Catholics in adhering to the office, even when decisions are not to their liking. 

The Holy Father knows this well. The decisions he eventually makes may erode some of the goodwill that now prevails. He has evidently decided on a measure of delay to extend the season of goodwill.

His addresses have been Christocentric and missionary — the core of Catholic identity. In world affairs, his comments on Ukraine and Gaza, for example, have reflected the global consensus on those matters. Even the apparently accidental Israeli bombing of the Catholic parish in Gaza was handled in an appropriately severe, but not inflammatory, way. 

He has correctly resisted pressure from some camps to attend to what they regard as urgent matters.

The synodal study group reports that were to be delivered in June have been put off to December, and Leo has added a few more study questions to the list. While the synod secretariat grinds on, Leo has kept a certain distance. Eventually, he will have to decide whether, as Pope Francis desired, the synodal process on synodality for a synodal Church should continue for another three years. If he decides instead to give it a decent burial, that will cause consternation among those most keen on a new way of “being Church.” No need to proceed precipitously and potentially provocatively.

A voluble segment of Catholic opinion was declaring, almost as soon as Leo was elected, that he had urgently to attend to questions about the “traditional Latin Mass.” He doesn’t. It is a priority item for a very small number of Catholics worldwide, and whatever he does will generate heat in the easily agitated digital world where many such congregate. Provocations there can be delayed, too.

Even one matter that does require immediate attention has been delayed. Every pope immediately vacates the office he held just minutes before his election. He therefore has to appoint a man to fill that office.

When Eugenio Pacelli was elected Pope Pius XII in 1939, he was serving as secretary of state. Exactly one month after his election, he appointed a new secretary of state. In 1958, Pope St. John XXIII took 14 days to appoint his successor as patriarch of Venice. Pope St. Paul VI took more than three times as long, 50 days, in 1963 to appoint a new archbishop of Milan. Pope St. John Paul II took even longer, 74 days, in 1978 regarding the next archbishop of Kraków. Pope Benedict XVI got down to business more quickly, appointing his successor as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 24 days. Pope Francis was even quicker, taking only 15 days to fill the vacancy in Buenos Aires. 

Like all new popes, Leo will has items on his desk that were in process before his election. The decision to name St. John Henry Newman a Doctor of the Church was one of them; nevertheless it added to the prevailing goodwill toward the Holy Father, as Newman is claimed by both liberals and conservatives, serving as a unifying figure.

After the Jubilee of Youth, Leo made two economic decrees, one relating to family benefits for Vatican employees and the other regarding procurement protocols. This may suggest a priority given to governance and finance questions — not unlike Pope Francis, who also emphasized such matters early in his pontificate. 

In contrast to his predecessor, though, Leo’s decree on procurement had been prepared when Cardinal George Pell served as prefect for financial matters, but had been blocked, as Cardinal Pell was subsequently sidelined. Are Cardinal Pell’s priorities and proposals making a return?

Pope Leo has still not appointed a new prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, the job he had held since 2023. His decision will likely be the first major appointment indicating his priorities. 

In Leo’s native country, new archbishops can already be appointed for Chicago and New York, and, next year, Baltimore and Los Angeles will also have their ordinaries turn 75. Major appointments usually produce some disappointments, so Leo may well take his time with those, too.

The summer of goodwill continues. Leo has no reason to end it.

This article was originally published by NCRegister.