As the world mourns the passing of Pope Francis, who died on Monday, April 21, at age 88, Saint Louis University faculty, staff and students who encountered the Pope remember his life and legacy.

In 2022, John James, Ed.D., professor of educational leadership in the School of Education, and Maureen Wangard, Ph.D., assistant director of graduate student initiatives at SLU, attended the World Union of Catholic Teachers (WUCT) conference in Rome, which included an audience with Pope Francis.

The World Union of Catholic Teachers was established in 1951 as a network of Catholic teachers’ associations with the aim of coordinating their study and research work to bring the teachings of the Church into the world of education. The conference included delegates from around the world; SLU was the only U.S. Catholic university that served as a WUCT member.

The highlight of the conference was an audience with Pope Francis, during which he celebrated Catholic educators as “co-workers of the pope” to encourage and motivate Catholic teachers to be fully aware of their important mission as educators and witnesses of the faith, as individuals or within groups of colleagues.  

James shared the following thoughts on the passing of Pope Francis: 

“Many have commented on the theological bent and Jesuit approach apparent in his encyclicals and apostolic exhortations. Others such as Chris Lowney, have addressed the Jesuit style and substance of how Pope Francis led. What I don’t see mentioned, and for particular importance for us in Catholic education, is how Ignatian has been the arc of his papacy in terms of strategy.

What do I mean by that?

Saint Ignatius set out to “help souls” and initially had no desire to found schools: it was counter to the notion of detachment. Nevertheless, he found that the “magis” or high leverage means to achieve the goals of the Jesuits was to found and operate schools.

The world was transformed!

Pope Francis must have considered: How the heck are we going to achieve all that we need to achieve as laid out in my encyclicals and apostolic exhortations? Like Saint Ignatius, he turned to schools.

In his letter announcing the launch of The Global Compact on Education (2019), he states: “since all change requires an educational process aimed at developing a new universal solidarity and more welcoming society” he states he is initiating a global compact on education to “unite our efforts in a broad educational alliance, to form mature individuals capable of overcoming division and antagonism, and to restore the fabric of relationships for the sake of a more fraternal humanity.” 

This launch came on the heels of Educating to Fraternal Humanism (2017), and Human Fraternity for World Peace (2019), a document signed in Abu Dhabi by Pope Francis and the Grand Imama of Al-Azhar, Ahmed el-Tayeb. Unfortunately, COVID impacted the launch.

Nevertheless, in January 2022, the Congregation for Catholic Education released The Identity of the Catholic School for a Culture of Dialogue, and Pope Francis convened a private meeting of the leadership of the World Union of Catholic Teachers that I attended in November, 2022.

In his address he cautioned against “ideological colonization,” saying “It is one thing to follow the culture of the moment, to speak the language of the moment, but it is another thing to allow yourself to be colonized ideologically.” He also made “one final request of you, one very close to my heart. Your Union can help raise awareness among teachers of the Global Compact on Education. As you know, this initiative which has had the support of many educational institutions, aims ‘to unite efforts in a broad educational alliance, to form mature individuals capable of overcoming division and antagonism, and to restore the fabric of relationships for the sake of a more fraternal humanity.”

I can’t help but think that akin to Lincoln’s Gettysburg address, the Global Compact on Education represents the “unfinished business” of his papacy that we are all engaged in Catholic education and obliged to continue.”

Wangard said meeting Pope Francis in Rome was a life-changing experience. 

“It reminded me that I'm a part of something much bigger than myself or my work with graduate students at Saint Louis University. Pope Francis invited us to be co-workers with the Pope by asking us to share the love and joy of Jesus Christ, particularly with young people who are our future,” she said. “Dr. James and I were the only Americans present and yet, we shared a common passion with people from Asian, African, Latin American, and European countries.  That sense of purpose remains in my mind to this day in the work that I do with graduate students here at SLU.” 

Jason Eberl, Ph.D., the Hubert Mäder Chair in Health Care Ethics at SLU, attended the Eleventh International Thomistic Congress in September 2022. Eberl presented a paper entitled “Thomism and Transhumanism: Can Biotechnology Enhance Human Flourishing?” The participants of this congress had the opportunity to celebrate Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica with Cardinal Luis Ladaria Ferrer, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, followed by an audience in the Apostolic Palace with Pope Francis.

“I remember my excitement when I first learned that the participants at an international congress on St. Thomas Aquinas were going to have an audience with the Holy Father. At first, I thought we were just going to be attending a large audience among many other groups, so I was astonished when we were escorted by the Swiss Guards through one of the porticos leading around the back of St. Peter’s Basilica and into the Clementine audience hall of the papal palace.

When Pope Francis walked in, the room erupted in applause, cheers, and tears. The Holy Father sat down and began to speak to us from his heart, with no prepared script, about the beauty of St. Thomas’s thought and the need to continue studying the inexhaustibly rich writings of the Angelic Doctor. Then we were invited to approach the Pope for a personal greeting. While it was just our group of conference attendees, it was still a couple hundred of us and Pope Francis made each personal encounter feel as if, for that moment, you and he were the only two people in the room.

I quickly prepared a few words in Spanish that, thankfully, did not fly out of my head the moment I stood within his warm and welcoming presence. Pope Francis, as I told him, has been a gift to the Church and to the world. With his passing, while I’m sure the Holy Spirit will grace us with the right pontiff for the present time, there will never be another Pope Francis.”

The Center for Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University has had three faculty members meet Pope Francis — Jeffrey Bishop, M.D., Ph.D., in 2016; former faculty member Tobias Winright, Ph.D., in 2017, and Eberl. 

Bishop, the Tenet Endowed Chair in Bioethics at SLU, said he remembers exactly when Pope Francis entered the room during his audience. 

“I remember standing there on the front row opposite where Pope Francis entered the room. As I watched him walk up to his seat to give his remarks, tears welled up in my eyes,”  Bishop said. “I thought about how this very humble man was the heir of St Peter and about all the history that had brought us to this point: this man in this role. After his remarks, when we all got to go up to him and meet him one on one, there was no pomp. He was just so warm and welcoming. He looked me straight in the eyes, as if we had known each other for years and had been reunited. It was so moving!” 

“Yesterday morning in I awoke to the news, tears again filled my eyes—tears of sadness for the loss of such a great man and tears of thankfulness for the gifts he brought to the papacy.”

In February of 2022, two SLU students joined Catholic university students across the Western Hemisphere for a virtual dialogue with the Pope. The virtual dialogue was hosted by Loyola University Chicago as part of the ongoing consultation process for the Synod of Bishops. SLU students Quique Riojas and Amy Cook were part of a group who addressed Pope Francis on immigration and economic justice issues.

Cook said at the time it was a “surreal experience” to Zoom with the Pope. After graduating from SLU in 2023, Cook joined the Jesuit Volunteer Corps Northwest for a service experience at the Kuskokwim River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission. SLU was named a top five producer for the Jesuit Volunteer Corps the year Cook and six other SLU students joined the program. 

Saint Louis University

Founded in 1818, Saint Louis University is one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious Catholic institutions. Rooted in Jesuit values and its pioneering history as the first university west of the Mississippi River, SLU offers more than 15,200 students a rigorous, transformative education of the whole person. At the core of the University’s diverse community of scholars is SLU’s service-focused mission, which challenges and prepares students to make the world a better, more just place.