Later in the same year, the Pope visited Mozambique, Madagascar, and Mauritius, advocating for peace and reconciliation following the years of conflict that Mozambique had faced.

He also called for protection of island nations’ natural resources and biodiversity. He quoted his papal namesake, Saint Francis of Assisi, in declaring that “Madagascar is famous for its natural beauty and for this, we say Laudato Si [taken from St Francis’s Canticle of the Creatures]…it is our duty to look after it with care.”

Pope Francis’s last visit to the continent was also one of the most important politically. In 2023 he visited South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo on a dedicated peace mission that included the then-Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby. Four years previously, in what was one of the most symbolic moments of his papacy, Pope Francis had knelt on the floor of the Vatican and kissed the feet of South Sudan’s rival leaders. In Juba he made an ecumenical pilgrimage to promote peace in the region.

The Pope’s visits to the continent were emblematic of his deep-rooted commitment to addressing current global issues through compassion and dialogue. One of his most impactful and famous speeches, given in Kinshasa in 2023, contained the memorable line “Hands off the Democratic Republic of the Congo! Hands off Africa! Stop choking Africa; Africa is not a mine to be stripped or a terrain to be plundered!”

Pope Francis’s relationship with Africa was grounded in mutual respect; he saw African Catholics not as recipients of charity, but as co-creators of the church’s future. 

As the world mourns, attention is now turned to the Pope’s successor. It has been over 1,500 years since the Catholic church has been headed by a Pope from the African continent. In the papacy’s history, three of its 266 popes have come from Africa; Pope Victor I (dates of tenure estimated to be circa 199 AD), Pope Miltiades (311 AD to 314 AD) and Pope Gelasius I (492 to 496 AD) came from Africa Proconsularis, a historic Roman province which now encompasses much of modern-day Tunisia.

There are 18 cardinals from the African continent eligible to be elected as Pope at the upcoming conclave; they include Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson who was a key advisor to Pope Francis, Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah who served as prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments from 2014 until 2021, and Cardinal Dieudonné Nzapalainga from the Central African Republic who, at 57, is one of the youngest cardinals.

Speaking to the BBC this week, Father Stan Chu Ilo, president of the Pan-African Catholic Theological Network said that “an African Pope is not a question of ‘if’ but ‘when’… the Catholic Church in Africa is now a theological, spiritual, and demographic powerhouse.” Conversely, Archbishop of Abuja Ignatius Kaigama stated “We are not praying for an African Pope… we are praying for a good and holy Pope.”

When the black smoke famously becomes white, it is clear that whatever lies ahead for the Catholic church, Africa is no longer on its periphery.