Pope Francis reached out to migrants and the LGBTQ+ community, but also drew unusual opposition

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Some takeaways about the life of Pope Francis, who died Monday:

Jorge Mario Bergoglio was born Dec. 17, 1936, to Italian immigrants in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the eldest of five children. He was ordained a Jesuit priest in 1969 and led the religious order in Argentina during the country’s murderous dictatorship from 1976-83. He became archbishop of Buenos Aires in 1998 and elevated to cardinal in 2001 by St. John Paul II. He was elected the 266th pope on March 13, 2013, on the fifth ballot.

— The first pope from the Americas.

— The first from the Jesuit order to be elected pope.

— The first to take the name of Francis, after St. Francis of Assisi.

— The first to visit Iraq, meeting its top Shiite Muslim cleric in 2021.

As Buenos Aires archbishop, Francis denied himself the luxuries his predecessors enjoyed, riding the bus, cooking his own meals and regularly visiting slums. This simplicity continued as pope, marked by Francis taking the name of the 13th century saint known for personal simplicity. He lived in the Vatican hotel instead of the Apostolic Palace, wore his old orthotic shoes and not the red loafers of the papacy, and set an example to the clerical classes by using compact cars.

Advocating for migrants was one of Francis' priorities as pope. His' first trip outside Rome in 2013 was to the Sicilian island of Lampedusa to meet with newly arrived migrants. He denounced the “globalization of indifference” shown to would-be refugees. He prayed for dead migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border in 2016 and brought 12 Syrian Muslims to Rome on his plane after visiting a refugee camp in Lesbos, Greece. His plea for welcome put him at odds with U.S. and European policies. He said in 2016 of then-candidate Donald Trump that anyone building a wall to keep migrants out “is not a Christian.”

Early in his papacy, Francis signaled a more welcoming stance toward LGBTQ+ people, declaring “Who am I to judge?” when asked about a gay priest. In a 2023 Associated Press interview, he declared that, “Being homosexual is not a crime,” and later approved blessings for same-sex couples, provided they don’t resemble marriage vows.

Francis became the first pope to use scientific data in a major teaching document and made care for God’s creation a hallmark of his papacy. In 2015, his environmental manifesto “Praised Be,” urged a cultural revolution to correct what he called the “structurally perverse” global economic system that exploits the poor and turned Earth into “an immense pile of filth.” Many popes before him, though, also called for better care for the environment.

The greatest scandal of his papacy came in 2018, when he discredited Chilean victims of clergy sexual abuse by siding with a bishop whom they accused of complicity in their abuse. Realizing his error, he invited them to the Vatican and apologized in person. He also brought the entire Chilean bishops conference to Rome, where he pressed them to resign. He convened a summit of the Catholic hierarchy in 2019 on abuse and sent a strong signal by defrocking former U.S. Cardinal Theodore McCarrick after a Vatican investigation determined he abused minors as well as adults. Francis passed church laws abolishing the use of pontifical secrecy and establishing procedures to investigate bishops who abuse or cover up for predator priests. But he was dogged by high-profile cases where he seemed to side with accused clergy.

In his first years as pope, critics had a living alternative in Pope Benedict XVI, who had resigned and was living on the Vatican grounds. That amplified the right-wing opposition to Francis' reform agenda. Some called him a heretic after he opened the way in 2016 to letting divorced and civilly remarried Catholics receive Communion. In 2018, the Vatican’s retired U.S. ambassador Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano published an accusation that U.S. and Vatican officials for two decades covered up McCarrick’s sexual misconduct and demanded that Francis resign. After Vigano amplified his criticisms and drew a following of his own, the Vatican in 2024 excommunicated him for schism.

FILE - Pope Francis arrives at the end of a mass in St. Peter's Square at The Vatican, Sunday, April 6, 2025, part of the jubilee of the sick and the health workers. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - Pope Francis waves as he appears at a window of the Agostino Gemelli Polyclinic in Rome, Sunday, March 23, 2025, where he has been treated for bronchitis and bilateral pneumonia since Feb. 14. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - Pope Francis holds his weekly general audience in the Paul VI hall, at the Vatican, Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)

FILE - Pope Francis, left, stands in front of Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI entering St. Peter's Basilica accompanied by Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, right with back to camera, at the Vatican, Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2015. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)

FILE - Cardinal Raymond Burke applauds during a news conference on the first anniversary of the death of Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, at the Italian Senate, in Rome, Thursday, Sept. 6, 2018. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, file)

FILE - Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, left, and Cardinal George Pell wait for the arrival of Pope Francis on the occasion of a Mass where the pontiff bestowed the Pallium, a woolen shawl symbolizing their bond to the pope, to new Metropolitan Archbishops, in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, Monday June 29, 2015. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, file)

FILE - From left front to camera, Sister Nathalie Becquart, Undersecretary of the Synod of Bishops Luis Marín de San Martín, Synod's Rapporteur Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich, and Synod of Bishops' Secretary General Cardinal Mario Grech, listen to Pope Francis, right, during the opening session of the 16th General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops in the Paul VI Hall at The Vatican, Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, file)

FILE - Pope Francis arrives to celebrate Mass on Lobito Beach in Iquique, Chile, on Jan. 18, 2018. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, File)

FILE - Pope Francis speaks during an interview with The Associated Press at The Vatican, Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2023. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File )

FILE - Pope Francis prays at the beginning of the third day of a Vatican's conference on dealing with sex abuse by priests, at the Vatican, Saturday, Feb. 23, 2019. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, Pool, file)

FILE - In this April 18, 2018 file photo, Pope Francis meets a group of faithful from China at the end of his weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican. The Vatican on Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2020, answered its critics and justified its decision to pursue an extension of an agreement with China over bishop nominations, acknowledging difficulties but insisting that limited, positive results had been achieved.(AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, file)

FILE - Pope Francis blesses sick and disabled people at the end of a pro-life Mass in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Sunday, June 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - An Amazzonian indigenous girl gives Pope Francis a plant during the offertory of a Mass for the closing of Amazon synod in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2019. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, file)

FILE - Pope Francis smiles to a nun as he walks in procession on the occasion of the Amazon synod, at the Vatican, Monday, Oct. 7, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)

FILE - Pope Francis receives Cannoli Siciliani (traditional Sicilian pastries) as he meets with faithful of Pilgrimage of the Vocationist Family, at the Vatican, Monday, May 22, 2023. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, File)

FILE - Pope Francis wears a red scarf as he smiles while leaving St. Peter's Square at the Vatican after an audience with with Altar boys and girls, on Aug. 4, 2015. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, file)

FILE - Pope Francis greets faithful after celebrating Mass on the occasion of the Migrant and Refugee World Day, in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Sunday, Sept. 29, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)

FILE - Pope Francis leaves at the end of his weekly general audience, in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Wednesday, March 27, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)

FILE - Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio leads a mass at the Metropolitan Cathedral in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Thursday, Feb. 14, 2013. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko, file)

FILE - Pope Francis is flanked by Mons. Guido Marini, right, the Vatican master of liturgical ceremonies, as he leads the Via Crucis – or Way of the Cross – ceremony in St. Peter's Square empty of the faithful following Italy's ban on gatherings to contain coronavirus contagion, at the Vatican, Friday, April 10, 2020. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, File)

FILE - Pope Francis tries to catch his cap as wind blew it away while arriving for his weekly general audience in the St. Peter's Square at the Vatican, Wednesday, March 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - Pope Francis leaves after a meeting with the performers of the living nativity scene of St. Mary Major, in the Pope Paul VI hall at the Vatican, Saturday, Dec. 16, 2023. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - Pope Francis talks about gays saying he wouldn't judge priests for their sexual orientation in a remarkably open and wide-ranging news conference aboard the papal flight on the journey back from Brazil, Monday, July 29, 2013. (AP Photo/Luca Zennaro, Pool, file)

FILE - Pope Francis, left, speaks to migrants, wearing white caps, during his visit to the island of Lampedusa, southern Italy, Monday July 8, 2013. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, Pool, File)

FILE - Pope Francis meets migrants during his visit at the Karatepe refugee camp, on the northeastern Aegean island of Lesbos, Greece, Dec. 5, 2021. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, file)

FILE - Pope Francis on the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, Wednesday, March 13, 2013. Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, who chose the name of Francis is the 266th pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, File)

FILE - Pope Francis delivers his blessing as he arrives to hold his weekly general audience, in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2014. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - Pope Francis delivers his blessing as he recites the Angelus noon prayer from the window of his studio overlooking St.Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — The discussions have taken place in an ornate Kremlin hall, on the polished marble of St. Peter’s Basilica and in a famously contentious session in the Oval Office of the White House.

What’s emerged so far from the Washington-led effort to end the war in Ukraine suggests a deal that seems likely to be favorable to Russia: President Donald Trump has sharply rebuked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, echoed Kremlin talking points, and indicated Kyiv would have to surrender territory and forego NATO membership. What’s more, he has engaged in a rapprochement with Moscow that was unthinkable months ago.

More recently, Trump has offered mixed signals — social media posts that perhaps Russian President Vladimir Putin is stringing him along — and a deal has yet to materialize.

While the optics so far have been in the Kremlin’s favor, no proposals that were put forth have been cemented.

And on Wednesday, Washington and Kyiv signed an agreement granting American access to Ukraine’s vast mineral resources that could enable continued military aid to the country under ongoing attacks from Russia.

Zelenskyy said Thursday the deal was the first result of his “truly historic” meeting with Trump at the Vatican before the funeral of Pope Francis.

One gain for the Kremlin is that Washington is talking again to Moscow after years of extremely strained ties following its 2022 invasion of Ukraine — and not just about the war, said Nikolay Petrov, senior research fellow with the New Eurasian Strategies Centre think tank.

Russian officials and state media from the very start of discussions with Trump’s officials sought to underscore that Ukraine was only one item on the vast agenda of the “two superpowers.” Trump and Putin talked in March about Ukraine but also the Middle East, stopping the proliferation of strategic weapons and even organizing hockey games between the countries.

Russia's main state TV channel reported that the meeting between Putin and Trump envoy Steve-Witkoff showed that Moscow and Washington were building “a new structure of the world” together.

In this sense, “Putin already got a part of what he sought” — the optics of Russia as a country that is on par with the U.S., Petrov said.

Trump has said Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula Moscow illegally annexed in 2014, “will stay with Russia,” and outlines of a peace proposal his team reportedly presented to Kyiv last month apparently included allowing Russia to keep control of other occupied Ukrainian territories. Trump, who had a contentious meeting with Zelenskyy in the Oval Office on Feb. 28, lashed out at him for publicly rejecting the idea of ceding land, and also said that Kyiv was unlikely to ever join NATO.

All of these reflect Moscow’s long-held positions, and Trump’s echoing of them suggested his administration’s vision was aligned with the Kremlin’s.

Trump also seemingly puts more pressure on Kyiv than Moscow in trying to reach a peace deal and appears eager to return to a more normal relationship with Russia and its “big business opportunities," said Sam Greene of King’s College London.

“Is there any part of this that doesn’t look like a win for Russia? No,” Greene adds.

But so far, all of this has remained nothing but rhetoric, with terms of a possible settlement still very much “in the air,” says Sergey Radchenko, a historian and a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

Moreover, there are still demands by both Russia and Ukraine that would be hard to reconcile in any kind of peace settlement.

Ukraine refuses to cede any land and wants robust security guarantees against future aggression, possibly involving a contingent of peacekeepers -– something a handful of European nations have been discussing and Russia publicly rejects as a nonstarter.

Russia, in turn, demands that it holds onto the territory it has seized as well as no NATO membership for Ukraine. It also wants Kyiv to “demilitarize,” or significantly reduce its armed force.

Radchenko sees the latter as a major sticking point in peace talks, because a strong, viable army is important for Ukraine to defend itself.

“If there are restrictions on the kinds of weapons Ukraine can receive (from the West) or the size of the army, then it will be very difficult to get them to accept this sort of agreement,” he said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov seemingly raised the stakes further this week by saying that international recognition of regions annexed from Ukraine by Russia was “imperative” for a peace deal.

Achieving that remains unclear, given that dozens of countries have decried the annexations as violating international law.

Some analysts believe it is in Putin's interest to prolong the war and keep making gains on the battlefield.

Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have threatened to wash their hands of the peace effort if there is no progress soon.

Putin, in an apparent gesture of willingness to keep talking, announced this week a 72-hour ceasefire starting May 8 for Russia's Victory Day holiday that marks the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

Zelenskyy dismissed the gesture as a further attempt by Putin at “manipulation” to string along the U.S., saying a ceasefire should begin immediately and last longer.

Greene noted that the Russian ruble and markets have been doing better recently over expectations of a peace deal and U.S. businesses and investors coming back, "and there may be a price to be paid” for pulling out the rug from under that.

The larger question is what happens on the battlefield if the Trump administration withdraws from the peace effort.

“When the Trump administration says they’ll walk away, we don’t know what that means. Does that mean they walk away from negotiations and keep supporting Ukraine?” Greene said.

Greene says that Ukraine probably doesn’t feel confident that the U.S. stepping back from the process means that Washington will keep supporting Kyiv, adding that Russia may not be sure of the Trump administration ending aid, either.

“I think it’s very difficult for the Kremlin to calculate the risks of dragging this out,” he said.

And U.S. Treasury Secretary Sctott Bessent said the mineral deal "signals clearly to Russia that the Trump administration is committed to a peace process centered on a free, sovereign, and prosperous Ukraine over the long term.”

A lot depends on whether Europe can step up and fill any gaps in U.S. aid.

If Trump walks away from the peace effort and still pursues normalizing relations with Russia, lifting sanctions, “this will amount to a major breakthrough” for Putin, but it's not a given, Radchenko says.

That would be an uphill battle for Trump as “there’s a lot of congressional sanctions that are predicated on the war in Ukraine,” Greene notes.

FILE - In this photo provided by Ukraine's 93rd Kholodnyi Yar Separate Mechanized Brigade press service, a soldier looks out of a shelter on the anti-drone firing position in Kostyantynivka, the site of the heavy battles with the Russian troops in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, April 24, 2025. (Iryna Rybakova/Ukraine's 93rd Mechanized Brigade via AP, File)

FILE - Russian soldiers guard a pier where two Ukrainian naval vessels are moored, in Sevastopol, on the Crimean Peninsula, March 5, 2014. (AP Photo, File)

FILE - Vice President JD Vance, right, speaks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, left, as President Donald Trump listens, in the Oval Office at the White House, Feb. 28, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/ Mystyslav Chernov, File)

FILE - In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Presidential Press Office, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, right, and President Donald Trump, talk as they attend the funeral of Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City, April 26, 2025.(Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP, File)

FILE - Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff greet each other prior to their talks at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, April 25, 2025. (Kristina Kormilitsyna, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)

FILE - In this combination of file photos, President Donald Trump, left, and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, center, are seen at the Elysee Palace, Dec. 7, 2024 in Paris, and President Vladimir Putin, right, addresses a Technology Forum in Moscow, Feb. 21, 2025. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard, left and center, Pavel Bednyakov, right, File)