What qualities are now required of a pontiff in the world of Donald Trump?

Pope Francis was a remarkable pontiff. A man of simple piety and considerable courage, he showed how to live compassion in an age of the 24-hour news cycle and social media. Via displays of mercy and decency, he embodied the conscience of a generation.

Who can forget the time Francis approached a man disfigured with neurofibromatosis to embrace and kiss him, or when he let a little boy sit in his papal chair?

Francis steadied the papacy’s reputation after the presentational problems of Benedict XVI’s pontificate. That pope’s shy and diffident personality were not suited to how his role had evolved. Benedict lacked the extroverted charisma required to make a success of being holy.

Francis relished it. His death therefore leaves the Catholic Church with a huge void. But it also gives the cardinals an opportunity to pause and take stock. What qualities are now required of a pontiff in the world of Donald Trump, Europe’s migrant crisis, economic turmoil and Russian and Chinese aggression? Are they the same as those they saw in Francis 12 years ago?

Francis’s critics – and there were many – looked beyond his acts of kindness. They were important but they were also just gestures. A pope’s moral leadership needs to go beyond such things. He needs a coherent philosophy which guides his pronouncements and advice to Catholics.

Francis had such a philosophy, for sure. But it was almost entirely congruous with fashionable progressive liberalism. It was not necessarily the right one for the Church.

Take his views on migrants, for instance, expounded at length in his recent autobiography. Francis saw migrants as victims, both of poverty and war. He urged Catholics to embrace them and to resist the efforts of governments that demonised them. But such a position was simplistic. It ignored human nature, which is to seek to look after our own first. American vice president J.D. Vance said as much in his now notorious pontifications on the ordo amoris.

Vance met briefly with Pope Francis on Sunday to exchange Easter greetings.

“I know you have not been feeling great but it’s good to see you in better health,” Vance told the pope. “Thank you for seeing me.”

Vance’s position has a long and respectable history in Catholic political thought and theology. Yet Francis dismissed it in a letter to Catholic bishops. In dismissing it, he failed to respect, or even acknowledge, Catholic tradition’s intellectual complexity. One man’s refugee can be another’s invader.

This is a subject on which many people hold complex, contradictory views and even values. A simple message will not resolve them. The faithful needed more rigorous and structured guidance that also engaged opposing arguments. Could Francis have done that? It would have enhanced his credibility with those who found him putting their faith and their politics into conflict.

Climate change was another area where Francis’ message would have benefited from this sort of nuance. Most Catholics understand nature’s importance as God’s creation. They want to “care for our common home” (as Francis put it) but they understand the trade-offs involved.

How should Catholics approach those trade-offs – what are the relevant factors and the principles that should guide the apportioning of weight to them? Francis’ key documents Laudato si’ (2015) and Laudate Deum (2023) did not really assist with this, although they were replete with casual criticism of the United States.

Francis’ criticisms of Israel were of much the same ilk. He was no antisemite but had an extraordinary blind spot when discussing the people of Gaza’s suffering. He drew attention to their suffering regularly, blaming the Israeli army for “cruelty” and, at one point, claiming children were being machine-gunned.

Many Catholics admired him for drawing attention to the Palestinians’ plight – and for his sheer dedication in calling the parishioners of the Holy Family parish, the only Latin rite church in Gaza, every night. Yet, Francis refused to accept in good faith Israeli arguments about their efforts to minimise loss of civilian life. He never explained why.

To show real moral leadership on this issue, Francis surely had to engage the arguments of those whom he criticised. On other issues, he would have done well to engage his own critics.

Repeating the same one-line mantras is effective on one level: you can be sure the message gets across. But it is rarely persuasive – and, in a world of multiple complexities, it does not do much to move the consensus on. Francis, all too often, just preached to the converted.

Would Benedict XVI have done better? It was a question that many of Francis’ conservative critics asked. But, in truth, that pope’s over-cerebral approach to every problem was just as problematic.

Benedict thought deeply, and subtly, about many things. But he struggled to convey his thinking to wide audiences in intelligible ways. His constant PR gaffes followed on from this.

The cardinals must hope now to find someone who represents a happy medium between these two talented but flawed men. It may matter almost as much as where that man stands on the liberal-conservative spectrum.

A pope who understands the politics of his place in the world and can communicate complexity, ambivalence, and ambiguity. That would be the great find for a church which still needs to win people over.

Miles Pattenden teaches history at Oxford University.