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 The leader of the 1.2 billion-member church will also face a
challenge in improving relations with conservative U.S. Catholics,
who have expressed dismay at his shift in focus away from issues
like abortion and same-sex marriage, which the church has long
opposed but Francis contends need not obsess about.
The city of Philadelphia began preparations more than a year ago for
the pontiff's visit in September, at the end of the weeklong World
Meeting of Families. Some 1.5 million faithful are expected to turn
out for an open-air Mass on the steps of the city's main art museum,
a crowd that could fill a 1.5 mile (2.4 km) stretch of parkway along
the Schuylkill River, said Donna Farrell, executive director of
meeting.
"What fascinates me is the degree to which he has captured the
attention of Catholics and non-Catholics. I find myself in social
meetings with non-Catholics talking about the Pope, and he's the
subject of great hope," said Mark Mullaney, chairman of Voice of the
Faithful, a lay Catholic organization founded in Boston in 2002 in
response to the clergy sex abuse scandal. "He's opened doors and
windows that have not been open in a long time, and encouraged
discussion."
 Some 74 percent of non-Catholics in America view Francis favorably,
with some 93 percent of Catholics reporting a favorable view,
according to a 2014 poll by the Pew Research Center. Both findings
were well above his 60 percent favorability rating worldwide.
Francis is also more popular with the roughly 76 million U.S.
Catholics than his predecessor, Benedict XVI, according to Pew,
though not so beloved as John Paul II, who held the papacy for more
than a quarter-century until his death in 2005. He was elevated to
sainthood in 2014.
A vocal advocate of human rights, John Paul II drew crowds of over a
million at outdoor events during his five formal U.S. visits, while
Benedict's 2008 trip was less grand in scale.
Francis has won praise for his decision to live in a simple Vatican
guesthouse and not the palace his predecessors have called home for
centuries. He has also captured Americans' attention by showing a
more tolerant side of the church, famously answering a question on
homosexuality: "If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will,
who am I to judge him?"
Like his predecessors, Francis has used his influence to improve
diplomatic relations between countries and played a key role in last
month's restoration of U.S.-Cuba ties. Francis wrote personal
letters urging rapprochement to U.S. President Barack Obama and his
Cuban counterpart, Raul Castro, and allowed the Vatican to host
secret talks.
Before his visit to Asia this week, Francis urged a similar thaw
between North Korea and South Korea.
FRICTION WITH CONSERVATIVES
While Francis has not broken on church teachings on homosexuality,
with Catholic doctrine condemning homosexual acts, his willingness
to discuss that and other issues has upset some conservative U.S.
Catholics.
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His Philadelphia host, Archbishop Charles Chaput, stirred a debate
last year when he told an audience that the meetings on family
issues convened by the Vatican had confused some people about church
teachings, adding that "confusion is of the devil and the public
image that came across was confusion."
Some saw the comment as a criticism of Francis, although Chaput has
since said those words were taken out of context and that he was
"overjoyed" about the Pope's visit.
Other conservative Catholics that have expressed concerns about
Francis' approach include Providence, Rhode Island, Bishop Thomas
Tobin.
"Pope Francis is fond of 'creating a mess.' Mission accomplished,"
Tobin wrote of the family meetings.
"There is definitely a tension," that Francis will likely want to
soothe, said Fr. James Bretzke, a professor of moral theology at
Boston College and, like Francis, a member of the Jesuit order.
"What Pope Francis can do is solidify his base among the more
centrist and center-left (bishops) and make it clear that he doesn't
want to punish or exclude anyone, but also make it clear that he is
going to continue with this basic approach, which is pastoral
outreach," Bretzke said.
Some conservative Catholics denied that Francis had changed the
church all that much, saying that more progressive Catholics were
too quick to conclude that his willingness to discuss controversial
topics signaled looming changes in church dogma.
"It's despicable that so many left-wing Catholics would jump on this
bandwagon. I'm disgusted by the way Catholics who know better have
sliced and diced his words," said William Donohue, president of the
Catholic League. "If you take a look at his positions on, let's say
marriage and abortion, there is nothing that is in any way different
from his predecessors."
(Reporting by Scott Malone in Boston; editing by Gunna Dickson)
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