Across 12 eventful years, the reign of Pope Francis saw no shortage of resonant images. One thinks of him standing all alone in St. Peter’s Square, in the darkest days of COVID, offering prayers for the world. Or greeting enormous crowds at papal masses in Iraq, East Timor, Myanmar. Or indeed, dispensing an Easter blessing, amid an adoring throng, on the last day of his life.

But the most affecting moments of his papacy were much humbler. From the start, Francis sought out “encounters” with the world’s poor. He embraced the disfigured and disabled. He mingled with migrants and refugees. He washed the feet of convicts. After addressing a joint session of Congress in 2015, he skipped lunch with the Beltway swells and instead paid a visit to the local homeless.

Always — in his homilies and encyclicals and off-the-cuff remarks — he evoked the plight of those “on the margins.” Evangelii Gaudium, his 2013 apostolic exhortation, mentions the poor 91 times. “It is easy to delegate charity to others,” he said in 2023, “yet the calling of every Christian is to become personally involved.” To an unusual extent for a Vicar of Christ, he did so.

His personal style matched his values. On being elevated to the papacy, he took up the name of Francis of Assisi, the 13th-century mendicant famed for (among other things) his thoroughgoing asceticism. In defiance of custom, Francis dressed plainly, eschewed papal luxuries and lived at a guest house rather than the Apostolic Palace. Humility, he insisted, was the “gateway to all virtues.”

Such sentiments are not exactly common in public life these days. Humility does not come naturally to the politician or the titan of industry in the social-media age. In the quintessentially modern businesses of influencing and brand-building, it is positively anathema. By embracing it so vividly, Francis proved to be a consummately countercultural force: a man who could “go viral” by hugging a pilgrim stricken with boils. The world was much the better for it.

Philosophically, the 266th pope may not have been to everyone’s taste. Some felt he indulged too often in politics. Others resented his imperious style and doctrinal ambiguities. Still others expressed disappointment that he failed to reform the church along worldlier lines. Such is life for a leader of 1.4 billion disciples.

Yet the world is unlikely to soon forget those recurring images of self-effacement: of a powerful man stooped in humility, praying for the poor, embracing the lowly — much as the founder of his faith had done, 2,000 years before. Requiescat in pace.

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