87% of British Catholics say Pope Francis did a good job, while being more likely to see the church as too conservative than too liberal
The death of Pope Francis last month has led to much reflection on his tenure as head of the Roman Catholic church and has turned eyes to the Vatican City, ahead of the papal conclave’s election of the next pope.
A clear majority of Britons (57%) believe that Pope Francis did a good job as pope, with just 7% feeling he did a poor job as head of the Catholic church. Among Catholics, the verdict is even more overwhelming, with 87% evaluating his 12-year term as pope positively, including nearly half (45%) saying he did a very good job.
With Francis’s passing, the next leader of the Catholic Church will be decided by the papal conclave, made up of all cardinals from around the world under the age of 80. Two-thirds have to agree on who should be the next leader of the Church.
While we unfortunately cannot poll the conclave, we can ask Britons what they think. Most of Britain’s Catholics (56%) say they are paying at least a fair amount of attention to the contest, including 19% saying they are paying a lot of attention to the election. Wider Britons are less invested, though a fifth of Britons (19%) say they are paying attention to the election of the new pope.
Nearly half of the population (46%) believe that who becomes the next pope can make at least a fair amount of difference to the world, though this is against a similar 44% who feel that it makes not very much or no difference at all to the world.
Among British Catholics, three quarters (76%) believe that the choice of who becomes next pope will make a fair amount or even great deal of difference to the world.
Although a majority of Catholics (54%) say that the choice of next pope won’t make much of a difference to Britain or their own life, 44% feel it will have at least a fair amount of impact on Britain and 42% say it will make a fair degree of difference to their lives.
Our data suggests that whichever candidate is successful and triggers the white smoke to be blown from the Sistine Chapel will have work to do to improve the reputation of the Catholic Church. Although Francis was widely seen as a reformer, most Britons (52%) still have an unfavourable view of the Roman Catholic Church, relative to just 22% having a favourable view of the organisation.
Even among Catholics, one in seven (15%) have a negative opinion of the Church itself.
A key question concerning the future of the Church is its position on social issues. Pope Francis attracted some controversy within the Church for being relatively liberal on some social issues, such as calling laws that criminalised homosexuality as ‘unjust’. This has led to some pushing for the election of a much more conservative pope.
But such attitudes are unlikely to be well received by Britain’s Catholics, who are largely split between the 42% who believe the Church’s current stance on social issues is about right and the 35% who feel it is already too conservative. Just 7% of Britain’s Catholics feel the Catholic Church is too liberal in its attitudes at the moment.
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