evangelical 360°
A timely and relevant new podcast that dives into the contemporary issues which are impacting Christian life and witness around the world. Guests include leaders, writers, and influencers, all exploring faith from different perspectives and persuasions. Inviting lively discussion and asking tough questions, evangelical 360° is hosted by Brian Stiller, Global Ambassador for the World Evangelical Alliance. Our hope is that each person listening will come away informed, encouraged, challenged and inspired!
evangelical 360°
Ep. 44 / The Jesuit Disruptor: Understanding Pope Francis ► Michael Higgins (Part 1)
The power of Pope Francis's leadership lies not in doctrine changes but in his transformative approach to religious leadership itself. Dr. Michael Higgins, author of "The Jesuit Disruptor," reveals how Francis's humble Argentine beginnings and Jesuit formation shaped a pontiff who prioritizes mercy over legalism, authenticity over authority, and pastoral care over institutional preservation.
Pope Francis emerged from the turbulent "dirty war" in Argentina with a deep commitment to serving the marginalized. As Dr. Higgins explains, Francis's journey from autocratic provincial to humble archbishop reflects a profound spiritual transformation that prepared him to disrupt centuries of papal tradition. When he stepped onto the Apostolic Loggia without traditional regalia and simply said "Buona sera," he signaled a revolutionary shift in papal identity.
What makes this conversation particularly valuable for evangelical listeners is understanding why Francis matters beyond Catholic circles. His rejection of clericalism and insistence that "the church is a field hospital" for the wounded speaks across denominational lines. The famous "Who am I to judge?" comment wasn't abandoning Catholic teaching but redirecting focus toward compassionate encounter rather than judgment. Similarly, his efforts to include divorced Catholics demonstrates prioritizing people over policies.
Francis' papacy hasn't been without struggle. His mixed success reforming Vatican finances and addressing clergy sexual abuse reveals the challenges of institutional transformation. Yet through it all, Francis has consistently humanized the papacy by rejecting its princely trappings in favor of authentic servant leadership.
Whether you're curious, cautious, or simply want to understand one of Christianity's most visible leaders, this conversation offers valuable insights into how Pope Francis is reshaping religious leadership for the 21st century.
You can learn more from Dr. Michael Higgins through his scholarship and publications.
And you can share this episode using hashtag #Evangelical360 and join the conversation online!
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Hello and welcome to Evangelical 360. I'm your host, Brian Stiller, and I'm pleased to share with you another conversation with leaders, changemakers and influencers impacting Christian life around the world. My guest today is Dr Michael Higgins, Professor Emeritus and Distinguished Scholar. His most recent book was titled the Jesuit Disruptor a personal portrait of Pope Francis, and he's written about the future of the papacy, what he refers to as the emergence of a new Leo XIV. An obvious question for evangelicals is why should we care who the Pope is? What sort of impact does the papacy have on the Protestant Church? Whether you're curious, cautious or simply want to be informed, Michael Higgins is here to help us understand and think clearly about one of the most visible roles of the Christian faith. So listen in and join the conversation on YouTube in the comments below, and be sure to subscribe and share this episode. Always use hashtag Evangelical360. This is our first podcast in a series of two. Michael Higgins, nice to have you here on Evangelical360.
Michael Higgins:Good to see you again, Brian.
Brian Stiller:Our lives, as we recalled, go back many years to CBC
Michael Higgins:Only 40.
Brian Stiller:40 years.
Brian Stiller:But, Michael, you have written this remarkable book called the Jesuit Disruptor, a fascinating read about the Pope who now has gone on across the Jordan, as it were, and a person who I had come to know in a modest, kind of evangelical way. But his story is an amazing story, both as it relates to who he was and then what he did. And so in our conversation today, as an evangelical wanting to know why in the world should I even be interested in Rome or your papacy and Leo XIV? Now, this might help to unwrap that and bring from your experience and your writing an understanding. So let's begin with Pope Francis and his life in Argentina, where he came from, and what that world did for him in preparing him to be a pope.
Michael Higgins:Well, as you rightly say, Argentina was the major shaper of his life in the early years. For sure, he was born in Argentina, he studied to be a priest in Argentina, he entered the Society of Jesus, so he became a Jesuit Not long after, just a few years after he was given responsibility as provincial for the order. The Jesuits are divided up into provinces and the head of that province is called the provincial. The Argentine Jesuits are divided up into provinces and the head of that province is called the provincial. The Argentine Jesuits were quite numerous and at one point there were two provincials. But he was a provincial of the Jesuit community where he presided for quite a number of years and during a very difficult period.
Michael Higgins:Actually, brian, in Argentine history it was the time of the dirty war. Many people disappeared or were disappeared. In fact, it was at this time that you get the madres de desperdicios, the mothers of the plazaidamyle of the disappeared, and you have torture, people being syringed with some kind of chemical and then thrown from helicopters Out into the ocean, out into the ocean or the river Plate. It was a terrible time and in many ways he handled it well, as well as one could be expected, but there was criticism over his handling some aspects of it. But after he served his term as provincial, he was sent to Coruba in the northern part of Argentina, to Cordoba, in the northern part of Argentina, and he saw that as a form of exile, because he came to realize, through prayer and discernment and interior reflection, that there were various aspects of his personality that didn't lend itself nicely to effective pastoral leadership himself nicely to effective pastoral leadership. He was inclined to be autocratic, to be decisive, to be inflexible, and he realized that, you know, he was inexperienced, he was too young, so he wanted to learn from this. At the same time, in a way, he was also being punished by his Jesuit spirits.
Michael Higgins:Eventually, however, he worked his way back into the good graces of both the Order and, indeed, the Archdiocese. He was named an auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires and then, when the archbishop died, he was named his successor, so became the archbishop, and then he was created a cardinal. During all this time, what you see is what you also see when he moved from the River Plate to the River Tiber. In other words, you saw somebody whose whole approach was marked by his humility. He didn't have a chauffeur, which he was entitled to. He took public transportation. He ate with folk, with ordinary folk. He maintained a style as an archbishop and as a cardinal which was out of sync with the general way in which archbishops and cardinals behaved. He lived, his accommodation was simple, his travel was simple. As I said, his presence was defined by both simplicity and humility, so that when he moved to Rome he carried that with him.
Michael Higgins:Some people sometimes say well, when he became Bishop of Rome, he changed. No, he didn't change at all. Actually, what he brought to Rome were those qualities of his leadership that you see coming to a new fruition in his papacy.
Brian Stiller:But I understand as a Jesuit, that was core to his being. So let's take a moment and unwrap what is a Jesuit? Where does it come from, what does it mean within the Catholic Church, and how would that, as an identity and a group to which he was a part, shape his life?
Michael Higgins:Well, you're quite right, he was a member of the Society or the Company of Jesus. The Order was founded in the 16th century in Spain, during the time of the Reformation. The Jesuits are a body of men who take vows, and they're not monks, they're not mendicants or friars, so it's not Francis of Assisi or Saint Benedict. So what's a mendicant? A mendicant is a friar, like the Franciscans or the Dominicans. Okay, and mendicancy means that they are dependent upon the generosity of others to give them alms and to feed them, to help them. So they take the vow of property very seriously. Monks are different. They live encloistered and they have a regular cycle of prayer built on the hours and the offices. The Jesuits were a significant departure from this way in which priests and non-priests those who didn't proceed to ordination, lived within the Roman Catholic Church. They were an apostolic order. They were to be in the world. They weren't monks, but they weren't friars either, and they established, throughout all of Europe and elsewhere, institutions of higher learning, secondary schools, hospitals. They were involved, certainly, in universities, the best universities, and they created their own as well. They were involved in scientific research and whatnot. So they became a major and potent force in the history of Catholicism, in the history of the Catholic Church In the 18th century they were what we call suppressed.
Michael Higgins:Various of the Catholic monarchs of Europe, particularly the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs, were quite disturbed by the Jesuit presence in Latin America, particularly Paraguay, brazil, and the Jesuits were taking the side of the indigenous peoples and they were affecting the success of the empires the Portuguese and the Spanish and they were in collation. Anyway, they applied significant and continuous pressure on the Pope. The Pope suppressed them so for about 40 years, like a Babylonian exile. For 40 years the Jesuits were dissolved as an order and they dispersed and many of them went to Catherine of Russia. They and that is, to Frederick of Prussia. They were picked up by non-Catholic regal figures who recognized this incredible resource. After about 40 years a subsequent pope reinstated them. So the order came back, was no longer under suppression and during the 19th century it flourished. It was quite conservative. During that period they were often called the pope's theologians. They were the Roman school. Then in the 20th century it's kind of a flip side then Many of the great progressives, many of the great theologians of the Catholic Church and intellectuals period and other disciplines as well, were Jesuits. So the 20th century Jesuit was different in many regards from the 19th century Jesuit. So the community's been around for hundreds of years.
Michael Higgins:They are formed spiritually around a primary text called the Spiritual Exercises. The founder of the order, ignatius of Loyola, was a military chap and he was wounded in the Battle of Pamplona and he was forced to have a very long convalescence and the surgeons had to break his leg after they had originally set it because it had been set incorrectly, and so he suffered a lot of physical pain. But during the extended convalescence he read the Gospels and he read the Lives of the Saints and he had a profound conversion. And during the period after his conversion he traveled to Jerusalem. He went to a place in Spain called Manresa and there he had a very deep religious experience, deep religious experience. And eventually the order was founded in Paris, approved by the Pope in Rome, and the Jesuits made it very clear that they were going to be at the service of the Pope. They've always seen themselves as the Pope's special legionaries, and that's true.
Michael Higgins:If you go to Rome, you'll find a cluster of buildings in central Rome that originated with the founding of society. So you have the Jesuit, the great church, you have St Ignatius of Loyola, another one of the St Ignatius of Loyola. You have the Baramino, which is a residence for the Roman students studying in Rome, and you and the Biblicum and the Gregorian and all these kinds of things. So the Jesuits became a very students studying in Rome and the Biblicum and the Gregorian and all these kinds of things. So the Jesuits became a very powerful presence in Rome. But they've traveled all over the world. They're missionaries by and large. That was a major thrust for them, and so they were in Latin America for quite a number of years, long before Bergoglio appeared.
Brian Stiller:And what would they bring specifically to him? How would his life have been shaped?
Michael Higgins:They would be shaped by the exercises which would bring him into both an emotive or affective, as well as intellectual relationship with Jesus. The exercises are built on the experience of Ignatius of Loyola, an experience which was profound psychologically and mystically, and they're divided into weeks and the Jesuits are under obligation to do the 40-day exercises twice during their lives as Jesuits. It's quite intense, and that spirituality is a spirituality of deep interiority, but it's a spirituality that is also defined by discernment, by the careful weighing of options, the realization that the attainment of God's love is not Pelagian. You don't earn it. God's love is gratuitous, of course, and you put your service, you put your life at the service of the divine majesty. And this is the kind of language that was used as a major text. It still shapes Jesuits all over the world.
Brian Stiller:And how would that have prepared him for the rule of papacy, and how did that mark itself during his rule?
Michael Higgins:Well, those are both good questions, because he was the first Jesuit pope, so he doesn't have anybody to model it on, right. So he didn't say well, a previous Pope who was also a Jesuit, no, he's the first Jesuit Pope. So he has to internalize what he would have internalized his training as a Jesuit and his experience as a Jesuit and that would find expression in his life as a bishop and in his life as Pope, both in terms of his prayer but also the way he appropriates reality. Let me put it this way and this is how the Catholic Church is structured If you're a member of a religious order and you become a bishop, you are no longer under the authority of the general of your order. You are now responsible directly and only to Rome and the Pope. So when he becomes Pope, the only one, in a sense, he's responsible to is God, so he's not responsible to the Father General of the Society of Jesus. Now he's the Pope. He's the Pope first. He's the Jesuit secondly. But the question about how his training prepared him to be a Pope is problematic in that no one ever knows. They're going to be Pope, it's not a career choice. They're going to be pope, it's not a career choice.
Michael Higgins:So my sense is he would have brought those gifts of discernment and interiority and prayer and the famous Jesuit maxim ad majoriam dei gloriam, which means you do everything for the glory of God, all things to stand for the glory of God, and also the belief which runs through everything, that's Jesuit Brian, the belief that nothing human is foreign to God. So if you're a Jesuit and I know scores of Jesuits, I've written two books on them and you're a biogeneticist or you're an astrophysicist or you're a psychiatrist, or you're a social worker or you're a teacher in high school, it doesn't matter, because what you do, you do for God's glory. So no body of knowledge is foreign to God and, as a consequence, in serving God, you should not be frightened of any body of knowledge by saying, oh, that's secular or it's mundane, or it's demonic, or to cripple my faith or whatever. No, no, no. There are so many Jesuits that are scientists and you know. You know that there are more meteorites named after Jesuits than anybody any other group of them.
Michael Higgins:Because of their work in astronomy, they run one of the greatest observatories in the world and they're run by the Jesuits. So he would have come from a religious tradition, an order that prizes the inhabitants, that recognizes the importance, core importance of spirituality and that talks about the discernment. But he would also have a deep thread or cord of obedience to the Father General and, when he was Archbishop, to the Pope. So his Jesuit life is important in helping to understand his makeup. But when he becomes Pope he ceases to be an active Jesuit.
Brian Stiller:Michael, you had this interesting quote by Christopher Pramuk which says like Merton, francis' root spirituality is profoundly incarnational, true to his Jesuit and Franciscan sensibilities. It is also profoundly cosmic and creational, trusting that the whole of human life, inclusive of our bodies, is part of a greater mystery about which we are still profoundly ignorant.
Michael Higgins:And you see that perfectly articulated in his encyclical La Datocee about our common home, the environment, environment, and in that document he makes a compelling case for what he calls human integral ecology, by which he means all of creation is connected. Okay, we can't talk about things being bifurcated or divided. These are false polarities or antinomies. We have to work towards a greater unity and a greater harmony, and that's why. That's why he never saw other religious traditions through an adversarial lens. He never said oh my God, the Muslims are here. What are we going to do?
Brian Stiller:Okay, Michael, that just brings us perfectly to ask the question why in the world did you call him the Jesuit disruptor? Like what did he disrupt? Pretty?
Michael Higgins:well, several things in the Catholic Church. To begin with, you may recall that when he was elected Pope he came out on the Apostolic Loggia. He didn't have the Mosetta and he didn't have the Apostolic stole, he didn't have the various pontifical raiment that was worn. Leo XIV wore it, for instance, benedict XVI did. He wore his simple white cassock and he said to the people Buona sera, good evening, nothing particularly religious, just welcoming everybody. And that warmth communicated profoundly to the large gathering in the piazza that this is going to be a different kind of book than his predecessor. And that's of course exactly right.
Brian Stiller:I asked him the question when you were brought out to be introduced had you planned what to say when you ask people to pray for you? He said no. He said just as I stood there I realized I desperately needed their prayer and he said that was kind of an involuntary response to the situation to the moment.
Michael Higgins:Well, I think you know. You put it very well Involuntary is right or spontaneous is right, because he was a descriptive guy. This used to drive his aides crazy and people listening to him.
Brian Stiller:I love your quote of him talking about the priest distorting the beauty of public prayer. He says, with rigid austerity or an exasperating creativity, a spiritualizing mysticism or a practical functionalism. a rushed briskness over an overemphasized slowness, a sloppy carelessness or excessive fickiness, a superabundant friendliness or priestly impassibility. And he goes on to say, which at times expresses a poorly concealed mania to be the center of attention.
Michael Higgins:That's right, and he felt that strongly. If the two synods that I attended as an accredited journalist, not as a delegate, so, that would have been the synod of October 2023 and the synod of October 2024. On both occasions, but one in particular, he railed against young priests and seminarians obsessing about their clothing, about their titles, about their honorifics and everything else, because he saw in this precisely a departure from the core of their ministry. The core of their ministry must be grounded in Christ and it must be grounded in the awareness or the encounter with Christ in the other. Well, it doesn't matter what you wear, what you call, what you present. These things get in the way of effective ministry. Speak very firmly about what he considered to be the fact that they were taking these marginal, indulgent, self-indulgent interests and giving them priority, priorities in the ministry of witness, which is a witness to and with the poor. Big thing for Francis. We're not a church for the poor, we're a church with the poor, so was he disrupting the church in that?
Michael Higgins:sense he was, and that's one of the reasons why I began with the example of him on the balcony. He already disrupted expectations around how popes carried themselves.
Brian Stiller:So he had an internal reputation already about him.
Michael Higgins:Well, not for the Romans. They wouldn't have known this, but he was Would the other cardinals have seen him and people the way he lived?
Michael Higgins:No, because Buenos Aires is quite distant from the Curia. He was never a member of the Curia in any real sense of the term. He would sit on some congregations or advisory bodies, but he was never what they call a dicasterio cardinal. He wasn't working in the Curia per se. So he's exposed. And he never studied at the Roman University. So his exposure to Rome was, by comparison to his predecessors, pretty minimal, pretty minimal. So that's one of the reasons why they elected him because they wanted to clean out the mess that was in the Curia. So they wanted somebody from afar who was untouched, who had a natural authenticity about him. And they got to know him and they liked what they saw. And his charge was clean the house. What he did, he scoured the house, but what he did was also set the style.
Michael Higgins:My big thing about Francis and I continue to see it now as we reflect on his ministry witness is he humanized the papacy, marian. He took the office of leader and he humanized it. It's a monarchy and many non-Catholics object to what the Pope has become, and many Catholics do as well, and in fact so do Popes. John Paul II I remember when he was here in Toronto said I'm the source of the disunity, I'm the source of the division. Help me to exercise my ministry as Peter, as a focus of unity of the church, rather than what we have been, which is a focus of division Can?
Brian Stiller:you take us through the particular areas that you've identified him as being a disruptor, I guess, the first one being when he was on that plane ride and he was asked about the gay issue. He said you know, who am I to judge?
Michael Higgins:Well, in that, as in every other aspect of his ministry, francis never changed doctrine. You know when his critics go after him and they say he's a dangerous man. The seat has been empty. We haven't had a real pope since Pius XII or at best, john Paul II. He's heretical and whatnot. This is all men. It's all crazy, because he never changed any doctrine. What he did do, however, and profoundly, and that's why it's disruptive, he changed the way the church prioritizes mercy and compassion over legalism and rigorism. So he would say, all right. The Catholic Church does not believe in divorce. It allows, however, for declarations of nullity, declaring that marriage, canonically, was never sacramental because there was improper intention or whatever other impediment exists. But many Catholics find that objectionable and they don't want to go through the process of getting an annulment and, as a consequence, what happens is they find themselves distant from the church and distant from a community that they love. And he says well, no, you shouldn't feel this way, this isn't right.
Brian Stiller:This isn't right. So his pastoral heart wanted to bring them in to experience the Eucharistic meal and the worship Absolutely.
Michael Higgins:And so what he does is he tries to regularize that relationship by expediting the process of the annulment or by finding other ways to ensure that the person, if their marriage is quotation marks canonically irregular, they still don't see themselves as marginal to the life of the church. So what he did was he prioritized inclusivity, mercy, flexibility over the more canonically rigid approach that was often taken in the past. And he did this because he always places the heart before the mind. He talks about what is more important than ideas Reality. What is the church for Pope Francis? It's not the Societas Perfectae. It's not the Societas Perfectae. It's not the mystical body of Christ, it's not the pilgrim people of God. Those are all good images, they're good metaphors and they are true, but for Francis it's the field hospital. The church is a field hospital. It's for the wounded, the broken, the shattered, in short, all of us.
Michael Higgins:So when he says something like who am I to judge? He's not saying that the Roman Catholic Church is suddenly now going to shift to a new kind of biblical anthropology and say we no longer hold to male and female, heterosexual normativity, all this kind of thing. What he does is he moves away from those kinds of debates because they're polarizing and what he says is what matters is the individual. That's what is the most important. And so he says I'm not going to judge. That doesn't mean he approves or disapproves. He says that's not the primary point of encounter. The primary point of encounter is to listen to the wounds of another, to share with them, to encounter them, to bring them along right. So he doesn't change Catholic teaching with regard to homosexual behavior, but what he does is he opens up the Catholic world to the beauty and the wisdom and the good in the gay relationships that we may not approve of but nonetheless are important to recognize as legitimate.
Brian Stiller:So he's pastor, but he's also administrator of a church that has had enormous financial scandals over the last few decades. How did he do on that?
Michael Higgins:It's uneven, because he discovered as many do it would be interesting to see how Leo XIV handles this that a great deal of this is embedded in a structure that predates the modern papacy, and so it isn't an easy matter to clean house. An easy matter to clean house? Oh, he did. He fired various people who were involved in vino activity of one sort or the other or who were culpable in some way around issues of financial skullduggery. He did that, but he also brought people in. He brought auditors in, he brought financial experts in, he worked to regularize the relationship with the Vatican's policy, with the general financial policies of the EU and things like that, get a kind of coordinated, ethical way of behaving. But even then he found himself in situations of corruption where the lay people were no different than some of these corrupt clerics, and so he would fire them. So it's a situation of endless reform.
Brian Stiller:No pope has really got a handle on this, and perhaps Leo XIV will Is there any way to get a handle on the amount of money and the assets, both liquid and physical assets, of Rome?
Michael Higgins:Well, he's trying to do that, or Francis tried to do that, by consolidating and putting under one or two specific heads of rubrics or bodies entities with direct responsibility, because they found that there were multiple of the organizations. The entities were operating independently of each other. So you have the Institute for the Works of Religion. That's technically the Vatican Bank, so the Vatican Bank's over here. Then you have the Patrimony Commission over here. It has other responsibility. Then you have the museums. The museums are the major revenue generator for the Holy See in the work that needs to be done.
Michael Higgins:So there are several different entities or niches, or little kingdoms right, and they could be part of a family history. Or this particular cardinal has had it for a long time relationships with particular financiers in the Italian financial world, some of them legit, some of them criminal. So it's a morass and none of the popes have been entirely successful getting it under control. Now he did achieve a fair bit. You know, two steps forward, one step back, but it'll be important for Leo to build it. I think that Leo will, partly because he probably has the administrative work to do so.
Brian Stiller:Let's go on to the clergy. Sexual abuse and he inherited it. More revelations came during his time. He had friends who he took them a long time to see their own wrongdoing. How did he do in handling that?
Brian Stiller:file
Michael Higgins:that one again. Some success but a lot of failure. And in this particular instance it wasn't resistance necessarily from within central office or even among the bishops. Part of it is Francis's own blind spot. You mentioned earlier about some friends yes, specifically a priest and some bishops in Chile, and he wouldn't hear of criticism about them. And he wouldn't hear of criticism about them until finally it was brought home to him and eventually the entire hierarchy of Chile offered his resignation, didn't accept all of them, of course, but it was a huge scandal.
Michael Higgins:The commission that he set up, the Pontifical Commission for Safeguarding several of the figures on that commission, stepped off because they said there are roadblocks everywhere coming from the Curia and from the hierarchy. And one of the priests involved, an expert involved in a lot of the stuff, a Jesuit, a German Jesuit. He gave up in despair. There's just no traction here. The Pope says one thing, but it just really doesn't happen.
Michael Higgins:Francis, I think, didn't understand the enormity of the problem until it hit him in the head, and it did several times. And when it did, he responded brilliantly to the Sauvé report in France, to the Comboni crisis in England, once he personalized it, once he could sit down, brian, like you and I, are talking to the victims. Once he could hear them, then he moved more directly to try to get to the root of the problem. But the root of the problem in the Catholic Church is clericalism, and every pope has been saying this, certainly from Paul VI on, but even with John XXIII. The big problem in the Catholic Church is clericalism, and clericalism breeds this culture of exceptionality.
Brian Stiller:And clericalism is. As a Catholic, how would you define it? Well?
Michael Higgins:it's a form of casteism Caste A caste. The priesthood becomes a caste, a special preserve for individuals.
Brian Stiller:But isn't that aided and abetted by the very theology of the church?
Michael Higgins:In great measure it is. But it also is a distortion of that theology. And various scholars have been trying to free the presbyterate, the priesthood, from the excrescences and evil that is attached to that office by clericalism. Like clerics, clericalists, to be even more precise, are people who think that somehow, ontologically, metaphysically, spiritually, they're superior to others. They are immune to accountability, they're a little potentates in their own spiritual fiefdoms. And that runs right through a very hierarchical church, very layered, hierarchical, tightly controlled and whatnot. But it does enormous damage to the priesthood itself, because the priesthood itself is the sacrament. It's critical to Catholic self-identity. You can't have the Catholic Church without priests and you can't have priests without bishops. So you need this, but what you don't need is the superfluity of structures and mentalities and whatnot that get in the way.
Michael Higgins:So about active perspiration did he disrupt that at all? Yes, he did. He disrupted it on several occasions, but not to the degree that it affected the kind of change he he wanted. You can see it in some of the statements he makes to seminary rectors, for instance in Italy, but in other places as well, where he berates every year. The cardinals would gather for their Christmas get-together and he would berate them. Well, the language was stunning.
Michael Higgins:Oh the language he uses. Now I mean, you don't win friends that way, right, you don't, bringing them all in calling them Pharisees or hypocrites and whatever. But you know, he often identified and this, I think, is one of the things that attracts evangelicals to him is, from the outset, francis doesn't put any emphasis on the princely nature of his office, because that's actually a late medieval Renaissance accretion. The Pope is the Bishop of Rome. That's his job. He's Peter's successor.
Michael Higgins:Where does all this stuff with princes and titles and palaces and everything else? He's got that whole historical legacy he has to deal with Now. He can't jettison it. He can't come in and say, okay, we're going back to a kind of early church, primitive spirituality and ministry. It's not going to happen. This is 20 centuries of Catholic Christianity. But what you can do is you can purify it. You can purge its excesses, successes. You can say, all right, we need to do something to make the priesthood and the Episcopate conform more clearly with what we think would have been Christ's intention, and those are the kinds of things he disrupted and they made him enemies.
Brian Stiller:Michael, thank you for being a guest on Evangelical 360. See you 40 years from now. Thank you On Evangelical 360. See you 40 years from now, thank you. Thank you, michael, for helping us grow in understanding as we seek to bridge the chasm between our two sides of the Christian global witness. By the way, this is the first part of two-part series with Michael Higgins and thank you for being a part of the podcast. I'd be so grateful if you would subscribe and share this episode and always use hashtag Evangelical360. If you'd like to learn more about today's guest, be sure to check the show notes or description below, and if you haven't already received my free e-book and newsletter, please go to brianstiltercom. Thanks again for joining us. Until next time.