If the Catholic Church re-focuses around helping the poor, I'll call it good. Not that I'm Catholic.

I didn't realize the Our Father and Hail Mary weren't standard things for a new pope to do until Cokie Roberts told me, so that's cool -- as she said, any little Catholic child could pray along with the pope.

There's never been a Francis? Huh. Someone in Slate letters said its referencing Francis Assisi not Francis Xavier. All I know about those particularly names is that my father (who has the middle name Francis) went with Xavier over Assisi for his confirmation name because he was a 13 year old boy surrounded by 13 year old boys.

I went with Francis of Assisi for my confirmation. Patron saint of animals.

If the Catholic Church re-focuses around helping the poor, I'll call it good. Not that I'm Catholic.

Same here.

Jesuits have a reputation for being scholarly, right? And Benedictines have the whole hospitality/welcoming thing? Is it Franciscans who are extra serious about poverty? Any other short hands? What have prior pontiffs tended to be?

My knowledge on this is very higgelty-pigglety.

I like observing the workings of millennia-old organizations and seeing how the ancient ways creep through.

Jesuits have a reputation for being scholarly, right?

Super-duperly so. (And, contrary to the new pope's reputation, they tend to live large. My brother's high school was run by Jesuits, and his joke was "I've seen their idea of poverty, so I don't want to know what they consider chastity.")

This guy is a scientist. Yeah, he's scholarly. Also more exposed than many other popes to liberation theology.

My brother's high school was run by Jesuits, and his joke was "I've seen their idea of poverty, so I don't want to know what they consider chastity.")

The priest down the road from us drove a BMW, and it always confused me. Maybe he was a Jesuit.

Also more exposed than many other popes to liberation theology.

Definitely so, although he doesn't seem to favor it. Still, he seems to take a pretty hard line on helping the poor.

And I like this, from the NCR profile: "Bergoglio may be basically conservative on many issues, but he's no defender of clerical privilege, or insensitive to pastoral realities. In September 2012, he delivered a blistering attack on priests who refuse to baptize children born out of wedlock, calling it a form of 'rigorous and hypocritical neo-clericalism.'"

So if you're a priest who's "A Jesuit" do you belong to a certain order that has meetings and vestments and what not? Or is it more of a stated philosophy along the lines of "I'm a Jungian" or "I'm a strict constructionalist".

I know if he were a monk he'd belong to an order.