Pope Leo: A Change of Voice, or a Change of Course?

Pope Leo XIV, Vatican II, and the Struggle Between Truth and Process in Today’s Church

What has unsettled observers of Pope Leo XIV’s early pontificate is not simply the presence of mixed signals, but the way those signals appear to cut in opposite ecclesiological directions at the same time. On the one hand, there are moments of unmistakable clarity, even severity, that read as a quiet but unmistakable rebuke of the governing instincts of Pope Francis. On the other, there is a persistence of appointments, emphases and symbolic gestures that seem to tether the new pontificate firmly to the very currents that have driven confusion and decline for decades. The question is no longer whether Pope Leo represents continuity or rupture, but whether he is attempting to hold together two visions of the Church that are, in truth, increasingly irreconcilable.