Pope Francis “missed the zeitgeist that migrant issues are more complicated and there are trade-offs,” said Miles Pattenden, a historian at Oxford, who studies the Catholic Church.

Taking the name Francis, after the saint who ministered to the poor, Argentine Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the first Latin American to lead the Catholic Church, has earned a reputation for living the ...

The new pope had a close relationship with Francis, whose legacy looms large. A key inspiration for that legacy, however, is the witness of Latin American Christians whose blood has been shed for ...

Pope Francis is given a San Lorenzo’s shirt as he greets the faithful prior to his first ‘Urbi et Orbi’ blessing from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica during Easter Mass on March 31, 2013.

First pope to succeed a retired pope in 600 years plans mass, prayers. VATICAN CITY, March 14, 2013— -- There was not a "dry eye in the house" at the Sistine Chapel the moment when former ...