Pope Francis, friend of animals, died just after Easter, just before Earth Day

(Beth Clifton collage)

Though scarcely an animal rights activist.  Pope Francis leaned farther in that direction than any Pope before him

VATICAN CITY––Pope Francis,  88,  heading the Roman Catholic Church since 2013,  died on April 21,  2025,  one day after Easter and one day before Earth Day.

The Vatican announced that Pope Francis died from a cerebral stroke that led to a coma and irreversible cardiocirculatory collapse.

The Pope had been ill for some time with double pneumonia,  arterial hypertension and type II diabetes,  but rallied to participate in Easter mass at the Vatican and to meet briefly with U.S. vice president J.D. Vance,  who converted to Catholicism in 2019.

(Beth Clifton collage)

“Chose papal name in tribute to St. Francis of Assisi”

“When the College of Cardinals elected Argentinian Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio in 2013,”  remembered Animal Wellness Action and Center for a Humane Economy president Wayne Pacelle,  a lifelong Catholic,  “there was special excitement among animal welfare advocates.

“Appropriately,  the pontiff chose his papal name in tribute to St. Francis of Assisi,  the patron saint of the poor as well as animals and the environment.

“No public declaration was more forceful or eagerly anticipated than Francis’ 200-page encyclical about animals and nature,  issued in June 2015,”  Pacelle pronounced.

“’Our indifference or cruelty towards fellow creatures of this world sooner or later affects the treatment we mete out to other human beings,’  he wrote in Laudato Si (Praised Be).  ‘We have only one heart,  and the same wretchedness which leads us to mistreat an animal will not be long in showing itself in our relationships with other people.  Every act of cruelty towards any creature is ‘contrary to human dignity.’”

Wayne Pacelle with Lily.
(Facebook photo)

“Powerful,  unambiguous words”

Said Pacelle,  “These were powerful,  unambiguous words from the world’s most influential clerical leader,  who called on the global community to end cosmetic testing on animals,  halt the abuse of animals in agribusiness,  and end the extinction crisis.  He associated himself squarely with the idea of the humane economy and the ethical marketplace,  repeating the dictum of his predecessor,  also a friend to animals,  Pope Benedict:  ‘Purchasing is always a moral—and not simply economic—act.’

“We read in the Gospel,”  Pacelle quoted further,  “that Jesus says of the birds of the air that ‘not one of them is forgotten before God,’ (Lk 12:6),”  Pope Francis wrote.  He continued:

“’How then can we possibly mistreat them or cause them harm?  I ask all Christians to recognize and to live fully this dimension of their conversion. May the power and the light of the grace we have received also be evident in our relationship to other creatures and to the world around us.  In this way, we will help nurture that sublime fraternity with all creation which Saint Francis of Assisi so radiantly embodied.’

(Beth Clifton collage)

“Throughout the Bible there are calls for mercy”

“The Pope did not invent a Catholic Catechism on concern for other creatures,”  Pacelle said.  “He was reminding us of one implicitly already in place and underscoring its urgency and relevance to our daily lives.  Throughout the Bible,  there are calls for mercy—the ‘righteous man regardeth his beast,  but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.’

“God in the Old Testament,”  Pacelle continued,  “says quite clearly that animals belong to him,  meaning that they are not ours to abuse:  ‘And the Lord said:  ‘For every wild animal of the forest is mine,  the cattle on a thousand hills.  I know all the birds of the air,  and all that moves in the field is mine.’” (Psalm 50: 10-11)

“Old fasting practices that are still observed,  dietary and slaughter rules,  and prayers before meals keep these principles alive with Christians while acknowledging the stain of violence against animals,”  Pacelle finished.

Eric Mills,  president,  Action for Animals

“Most ambitious papal document of the past 100 years”

“The British newspaper The Guardian called Pope Francis’ Enclycical on Climate Change & Inequality “The most astonishing and perhaps the most ambitious papal document of the past 100 years,”  wrote Action for Animals founder and coordinator Eric Mills for ANIMALS 24-7 in July 2015.

“Certainly it may have the most to say about the human relationship toward animals,”  Mills assessed.

“Born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in 1936,  to Italian immigrant parents in Buenos Aires,  Argentina,”   Mills explained,  “Pope Francis is the first Latin American and the first Jesuit to lead the Roman Catholic Church––and the first non-European leader of the church in 1,200 years.  He chose to name himself after St. Francis of Assisi,  the patron saint of animals and the environment,  and a champion of the poor and dispossessed––a major boon to our movement.

(Beth Clifton collage)

“Do animals go to heaven?”

“Pope Francis has often mistakenly been given credit for saying that dogs and cats go to heaven,”  Mills recalled.  “In truth,  that observation came from his predecessor,  Pope Paul VI,  who once told a little boy grieving the loss of his pet that,  ‘One day we will again see our animals in the eternity of Christ.  Paradise is open to all God’s creatures.’  But this should not have been surprising,  since the word ‘animal’ comes from the Latin word ‘anima,’ meaning ‘soul.’   And I am betting that Pope Francis would agree.

“Pope Francis’ Encyclical on Climate Change & Inequality is highly readable and rife with worthwhile quotes regarding our attitudes toward animals,  the environment,  the disenfranchised and our endangered planet,”  Mills continued.

(Beth Clifton collage)

“No place for tyrannical anthropocentrism”

“Clearly,  the Bible has no place for a tyrannical anthropocentrism unconcerned for other creatures,”  Mills quoted.

“The Biblical accounts of creation invite us to see each human being as a subject who can never be reduced to the status of an object,”  Pope Francis elaborated.

“Yet it would also be mistaken to view other living beings as mere objects subjected to arbitrary human domination.  When nature is viewed solely as a source of profit and gain,  this has serious consequences for society.”

(Beth Clifton collage)

Frequent criticism from animal advocates

Even before Pope Francis issued his Encyclical on Climate Change & Inequality,  he came under frequent criticism from animal advocates for not taking animal advocacy farther than he did.

“In South Korea,”  wrote April Kim from Busan,  South Korea to ANIMALS 24-7 in 2014,  “not only are many Catholic priests fans of dog meat, but they often encourage their congregations to go out and eat dog meat and even sell dog meat at their church bazaars.

“Fed up with their hypocrisy,”  April Kim continued,  “members of several animal rights groups protested on August 18,  2014 when Pope Francis came to visit Korea.

(Beth Clifton collage)

Took case to Korean bishops

“The English translation of the banner held up alongside the Papal parade route read,  ‘Pope, priests and followers,  please put an end to the slaughter and consumption of dogs.’

“This group also plans to send an official letter to the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of Korea,”  April Kim said,  “urging them to stop eating dog meat.”

Whether Pope Francis took any notice of either the banner or the issue is unknown.  What is known is that there was no visible Catholic opposition to the national ban on dog meat passed 298-0 by the South Korean parliament on January 9,  2024,  with a three-year phase-in period.

[See Dog meat trade ban helps signal a new day for animals in South Korea.]

(Beth Clifton collage)

Tiger petting

Pope Francis on June 16,  2016 petted both a tiger cub and a black panther cub at a jubilee for circus and traveling show people in the Vatican.

Reported Vatican Radio,  “Francis thanked the traveling performers for how they opened their shows ‘to the most needy , the poor and the homeless,  prisoners and disadvantaged children.’”

“This too is mercy — to sow beauty and joy in a world sometimes gloomy and sad,”  Pope Francis said.

Activists working to abolish animal use in circuses and exotic cat breeding to serve the cub-petting industry were infuriated.

(Beth Clifton collage)

Did not take vegan pledge

Guardian environment editor Damian Carrington on February 6,  2019 reported that the Blue Horizon International Foundation,  “the charitable arm of the Blue Horizon Corporation, which invests in companies producing plant-based foods and aims to ‘accelerate the removal of animals from the global food chain,”  had offered Pope Francis $1 million to donate to the charity of his choice if he would go vegan for Lent.

Pope Francis apparently did not respond to the offer,  nor could he have accepted it,  since papal actions are not supposed to be for sale,  despite many examples to the contrary in earlier centuries.

(Beth Clifton collage)

Restatement of Catechism

On January 5,  2022,  Pope Francis remarked in a homily that,  “Many couples do not have children because they do not want to,  or they have just one – but they have two dogs,  two cats,  who take the place of children.

“This may make people laugh,  but it is a reality.

“ And this denial of fatherhood or motherhood diminishes us.  It takes away our humanity,”  Pope Francis said  “A man or woman who does not develop the sense of fatherhood or motherhood is lacking something,  something fundamental,  something important.”

This too brought a firestorm of criticism,  including from In Defense of Animals’ Interfaith Vegan Coalition.

What Pope Francis said,  however  was essentially just a restatement of passage 2418 of the 1992 update of the Catholic Catechism,  published in English in 1994:  “It is contrary to human dignity to subject animals to useless suffering or to sacrifice them without consideration of their lives. It is also unworthy to invest in them sums that would [be better used to ease] the misery of man.  One may love animals; but one may not direct toward them affection which is proper only to human beings.”

(Beth Clifton collage)

Circus protest

The tiger and panther cub petting incident resurfaced in February 2023,  when Catholic Concern for Animals objected to the participation of Papal Almoner Cardinal Konrad Krajewski in a performance of the Rony Roller Circus in Rome.

Said Catholic Concern for Animals chief executive Chris Fegan,  “It is totally unacceptable for animals to be used in circuses in the year 2023.  We believe it is also contrary to the writing of His Holiness in the Encyclical Laudato Si,  and have written to Pope Francis to let him know our views,”  joined by the In Defense of Animals’ Interfaith Vegan Coalition.

(Beth Clifton collage)

Bullfighting

Two women representing People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals on August 7, 2024. “briefly stormed Pope Francis’ general audience in the Vatican in a protest against bullfighting,”  reported Christopher Lamb and Catherine Nicholls of CNN.

“The activists climbed over barriers from the pews into the aisle of the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall,”  Lamb and Nicholls recounted.  “They wore T-shirts that read ‘Stop blessing corridas’ and held signs reading ‘Bullfighting is a sin.’

“The women ran down the aisle,  getting within meters of the pope,”  Lamb and Nicholls continued,  “before security officials intervened.  The activists were then escorted from the building, still holding up their signs.

“A similar protest by PETA took place in January 2024 during a service for Christian unity presided over by Pope Francis at the Basilica of St Paul-Outside-the-Walls in Rome,”  Lamb and Nichols said.

(Beth Clifton collage)

“Cruel & base spectacles of the devil”

While recent popes have not addressed bullfighting,  and bullfights are often held in conjunction with Catholic religious festivals,  Pope Pius V in 1567 issued a papal bull condemning bullfighting and other forms of animal fighting for entertainment as “cruel and base spectacles of the devil,”  making bullfighting promoters subject to excommunication.

Pope Pius IX reiterated the 1567 bull in 1846,  early in his papacy,   which ended with his death in 1878.

Pius XII cited the proclamations by Popes Piux V and IX in 1940,  refusing to meet with a delegation of bullfighters.

(Beth Clifton collage)

Pope Francis & the dinosaurs

None of that mollified ANIMALS 24-7 reader Carol Ames,  a frequent critic of Catholicism in general and Pope Francis in particular in many posted comments.

On December 12,  2023,  for instance,  Ames alleged that Pope Francis “does and says absolutely nothing to condemn rodeos,  bullfighting,  trophy hunting,  factory farming,  puppy mills,  etcetera as a sin.”

This may be true,  though some of Pope Francis’ words on environmental issues have implicitly been critical of factory farming.

Beth & Merritt Clifton with friends.

Yet it is also true that Pope Francis appears to have said more on behalf of animals than any pope before him.

Please donate to support our work:

More related posts: