The Pontiff Archetype (VI): The End of the Cycle
When the symbol dies… the myth begins
The death of Pope Francis has been sold as a historical event.
But history, as they tell it, falls short.
This wasn’t just the end of a papacy. It was the closing of a spiritual era. One of those that don’t open every day… and when they close, leave an echo that hits you straight in the chest.
Francis wasn’t just a leader.
He was a living symbol. And when symbols die, they stir things no one wants to look at too closely.
Because this isn’t about protocol or liturgy.
The last shepherd who walked without a throne, the reformer who bled alone, the mystic who didn’t speak in riddles.
And yes, when a symbol like that dies, a myth is born. Not by magic. By collective need.
Myths aren’t born when someone arrives. They’re born when someone leaves. Jesus didn’t become Christ because of what he said, but because of how it ended. Gandhi became eternal when he fell.
And Francis, without seeking it, is crossing that threshold being the man becoming something larger than his body, his name, or his pontificate.
During his time at the helm, he embodied a spirituality that didn’t try to seem perfect—just alive. He didn’t come to give you lessons from a marble pulpit. He came to be present.
To touch the wound.
To soften his voice.
To cry with refugees without asking for a camera. His strength was that he didn’t claim to have all the answers. And his rare gift was that, instead of selling prepackaged faith, he taught us how to hold doubt without fear.
Today, that guide is no longer here. And with him, a rare model disappears: the spiritual leader who inhabits conflict instead of avoiding it, who moves between tradition and the tremor of change. Who doesn’t run from the mud.
So now what?
Who will speak for those no one wants to hear?
Who will dare to put compassion at the center without turning it into a hollow marketing slogan?
And does a symbol even exist today that can unite without manipulating?
Spoiler: we don’t know.
Because we live in a world that burns through leaders and chews up gurus at the speed of a tweet. Shared symbols are on the verge of extinction. And without symbols, there are no rituals. Without ritual, no transformation. Without transformation… we remain lost.
This isn’t just any ending. It’s an edge. A threshold. And thresholds always come with a mix of vertigo and promise. Francis can no longer act, but now he begins to speak louder.
As myth, a mirror and a challenge.
And here’s the key point: a myth doesn’t survive because of what it was. It survives in how we live it. In how we remember it without putting a halo on it. In how we let it keep unsettling our conscience—even after death.
Maybe that’s the most uncomfortable legacy he leaves.
There is no replacement.
There is an open question, a sign pointing inward. Because now it’s up to us to learn to walk without a crutch. To search within for what we used to be handed.
Afraid to live without a guide? Totally normal. But be careful—if we don’t claim that void, others will fill it with plastic idols.