The world needs popular leadership, but not the sort that exploits and cultivates cynicism and resentment. Yet that type of populism is increasing across the globe. The one great exception is Pope Francis, who for five remarkable years has provided a civilising, humanising, compassionate influence wherever he has turned his gaze. He has, to put it crudely, weaponised God’s merciful love as a moral and political force to be reckoned with. And it has made him popular: as much, if not more so, outside the Church than in.