We woke Monday morning to the news that Pope Francis died at 88, just the day after appearing for Easter Sunday, greeting the crowds at the Vatican’s St Peter’s Square. While sorrowful, we are also grateful for his life and leadership.

Pope Francis, a resolute defender of the rights and dignity of migrants, refugees, and victims of human trafficking. He reminded us, with clarity and conscience, of our call to build a just and compassionate society. He leaves a legacy that includes a landmark encyclical, Laudato Si’, that urges action on climate change and environmental degradation, which he linked inextricably to perpetuating the cycle of poverty. During his pontificate, the Vatican weighed in on faith-consistent investing with Mensuram Bonam, reflecting on how we use our investments and finances to create a better world. In all, Pope Francis spoke boldly against economic systems that exclude, denigrate, and discard human life, calling for an inclusive economy where all might participate and thrive. At SGI, we are grateful for and inspired by Pope Francis’ leadership over the last dozen years.

I was blessed to meet with Pope Francis last April. He has touched my life personally and publicly. I came to SGI as our founder, Fr. Mike Crosby, O.F.M., Cap., responded to Pope Francis’ call after the Rana Plaza disaster. The invitation to participate in the ongoing work of Mensuram Bonam felt as a new call to serve.

As a nonprofit ministry that seeks to align values and faith with investing, we have long drawn strength from Pope Francis’s unwavering commitment to social justice. Pope Francis often called us to resist indifference and to choose solidarity, hospitality, and justice. His witness and summons strength in times of difficulty. Pope Francis believed deeply in a Church that walks with the poor, that “serves as a field hospital for the wounded.” His legacy calls us to recommit ourselves to that vision—with renewed courage, compassion, and resolve.

As he noted in his encyclical Evangelii Gaudium, he wanted “a church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security.” Our faith-based members do this kind of work every day in local communities. The work that we do in faith-consistent investing would not have anywhere near the impact it does without the work our members do daily on the local level.

As we celebrate Pope Francis’ life, what follows are remarks from members reflecting on inspiration drawn from Pope Francis.

Pope Francis’ book Let us Dream and the Economy of Francesco are the why of our amplification of our Impact Investing since 2021. Needing to disrupt the economy so all benefits, including Mother Earth are the focus as well. These resonate clearly with our Franciscan spirituality of being in relationship with all of creation.

Pope Francis beckoned us to remember that the poor should be the subject rather than the object of our work as well as keeping aspects of Encuentro in each of our investments. Encuentro and investing through the lens of Catholic Social Teaching principles allows us to be focused on our values, investing in a positive way of including investments that have an impact greater than financial return.

Sue Ernster, FSPA

President

Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration

Pope Francis embodied values that guide the Sisters of St. Francis’ investments: dignity of the human person, peace, sacredness of creation in all forms, option for the poor, justice, and promoting the Common Good. His life was about being with and for all of God’s creation. Our venture into impact investing is a more direct way of promoting these values. We enrolled in the Laudato Si’ Action Platform to further our mission of living in right relationship with all of creation. Pope Francis was and still is an inspiration to us as we endeavor to live our lives guided by these values.

Sr. Marie Cigrand, O.S.F.

Dubuque Franciscans

The passing of Pope Francis is a time of sadness but also a blessed opportunity to reflect upon the impacts of his pastoral challenges and guidance throughout his papacy. Encyclicals such as Laudato Si’ or the Laudate Deum Apostolic Exhortation have invited deeper discernment, a strengthening of our community’s commitments to respond to the crisis of the earth, and to seek acts of care for our common home through the development of our organizational Laudato Si’ plan. For example, our St. Paul Province’s Investing for Social Impact Committee has continued to review our socially responsible investment strategy and works through the lens of environmental justice, mitigating climate change and fulfilling Earth’s sacred mandate. Our ISI committee has re-invested and intentionally sought out new investments in local, national and global socially responsible institutions especially with commitments to helping the poor and to being good environmental stewards. As a socially responsible investor, we have participated in company dialogues to support enhancing corporate environmental practices. We’ve also supported the Seventh Generation Interfaith (SGI) Coalition for Responsible Investment’s Fall Conference “The Climate is in Crisis: What Can Investors Do?” As we mourn the passing of Pope Francis, we will continue to remember and to be inspired by the humble witness of his papacy.

Marty Roers

Justice Office in the St. Paul Province

Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet

We felt Pope Francis’ love and compassion for the poor and marginalized, and his love for the planet. His influence as a global leader created earth friendly collaboratives around the world. He gave us confidence to push for greater care of the planet and we will continue to work with a local utility company for a satisfactory resolution on its GHG emissions and net-zero strategies.

Dan Tretow

School Sisters of St. Francis

The Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Aberdeen, South Dakota came to the wild Dakota Territory prairies in the 1880s from the green grasslands of Ireland. Our constitution reminds us that we are “women of the prairies.” Stewardship of our mission to nurture the people and the land and addressing the causes of injustice brands our mission of healing and caring into the fabric of our being.

After Pope Francis issued his landmark encyclical, Laudato Si’, our congregation committed to establishing a Laudato Si’ ministry, to restore and regenerate our prairie property. We truly believe that what we do on our home land benefits our global common home. The same reason we desire to regenerate our natural resource, the land, we work to change the structures that oppress people and planet. This is the work of Justice. There is no better way to do that than to engage in shareholder advocacy. Laudato Si’ challenged us and supported our shareholder advocacy efforts as an integral part of leveraging the gift of our investments for comprehensive solutions to the climate crisis. We have engaged corporations with assets larger than most countries in the world! Whenever he saw injustice, Pope Francis spoke out with firmness and compassion. We now must carry on his legacy. “All it takes is one good person to restore hope!” LS, 71. We are not only women of the prairies. We are women of hope!

Sr. Pegge Boehm, P.B.V.M.

Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Aberdeen, South Dakota

In his address to the international event of The Economy of Francesco (2022), Pope Francis stated:

“There is the concrete economy made up of faces, looks, people, of small banks and businesses, and there is the economy that is so large as to seem abstract, of multinationals, states, banks, investment funds. There is the economy of money, of bonuses and very high salaries, alongside an economy of care, of human relations, of salaries that are too low to be able to live well. Where is the meeting point between these opposites?”

Where is the meeting point between these opposites? As the Promoter of Justice for the Dominican Sisters ~ Grand Rapids that question has often been a challenge. How do we translate the multitude of issues to the multitude of people who are also responsible to respond in prayer, advocacy, and behavior. Our involvement in Corporate Responsible Investing, i.e. our study of issues and co-filing regarding those issues, is often caught up in that abstract realm of finances, lobbying, economic structures and the like that do not seemingly impact our day-to-day lived reality.

It becomes the mission of the Promoter’s office to explore and communicate the intersectionality of the abstract to our members. Sometimes it is apparently easy: e.g. the production of chocolate candy with child labor and trafficking in the harvesting process. We can display the faces of the child slaves and find where fair trade chocolate can be readily purchased. That is one example. Similarly, what alternatives are realistic to avoid purchasing of products from the likes of Amazon, Nike, Exxon Mobil, et.al. We continue to cofile resolutions concerned with human rights, care of creation, exploitation of the poor. We need for those resolutions to be made explicit to our people for them to reinforce those efforts with their consumer power.

Laudato Si’ #206: “A change in lifestyle could bring healthy pressure to bear on those who wield political, economic and social power. This is what consumer movements accomplish … They prove successful in changing the way businesses operate, forcing them to consider their environmental footprint and their patterns of production. When social pressure affects their earnings, businesses clearly have to find ways to produce differently. This shows us the great need for a sense of social responsibility on the part of consumers. “Purchasing is always a moral – and not simply economic – act”.

Sister Mary Brigid Clingman, OP

Promoter of Justice

Dominican Sisters ~ Grand Rapids

There is an additional reflection authored by Fr. John Celichowski, O.F.M., Cap. found here.