Is Pope Francis in Heaven?

Pope Francis has died, sparking grief (progressive and centrist Catholics), jubilation (conservative Catholics), a meltdown of streams for the film Conclave, and a secret Signal chat where a certain vice president might claim God killed the pope for owning him after their meeting.

I’m not Catholic. I was indoctrinated to detest Catholicism, to be suspicious of all Catholics, to openly tell them their faith was “wrong.”

I grew up in a Protestant Christian Nationalist church whose pastor regularly preached sermons about how all Catholics, including the pope, were going to hell. Numerous Protestant Christian Nationalist churches will likely commemorate Francis’ death by offering similar messages from their pulpits this Wednesday evening or Sunday morning.

While I try not to comment on what happens to other souls in the hereafter, I admired Francis. I didn’t agree with everything he proclaimed, but I saw his elevation to pope as a step toward a more inclusive church. I’m sad to see him depart this role and hope the church selects another more progressive cardinal to fill his robes. May he rest in peace.

Much has been written about the schism between conservative Catholics and Francis supporters. I’m not especially hopeful that real life will play out like the movie Conclave.

Why?

Because conservative Catholics like Leonard Leo, Sam Alito, JD Vance, Peter Thiel, Kevin Roberts and similar are hardcore Christian Nationalists. They have counterparts in Catholic leadership. Project 2025 was shaped in large part by their collective conservative Catholic dogma.

A Christian Nationalist pope could supercharge their Project 2025 plan to install theocratic government by ordering all Catholic congregations to return to hardcore conservative teaching on subjects like birth control, homosexuality, helping the less fortunate, and more.

A conservative pope would give Catholics their Christian Nationalist dictator, someone to lead their unholy crusade to force everyone to live by Catholic dogma. He would follow the Christian Nationalist tenets on SIN and empathy I outlined last week:

SIN = BAD.

SIN is SIN. There are no degrees of SIN. A person’s background and circumstances don’t matter.

And HELPING A SINNER (EMPATHY) = ALSO BAD.

A dictator/pastor-priest-pope congregations are indoctrinated not to question.

This is a guest post from Andra Watkins, who writes For Such a Time as This. Read the original article here. Subscribe to Andra’s Substack here.