Dan MacIsaac lives on Vancouver Island, Canada. His poetry has appeared in the print magazines Poetry Salzburg, Vallum, Poetica and Agenda. His writing can also be viewed at www.this.org. He is the winner of the 2014 Foley Prize.
McCarrick had been removed from ministry at the direction of the Vatican in June 2018 due to a credible allegation of sexual abuse of a teenager investigated by the Archdiocese of New York.
The thought of losing Pope Francis one day is a hard one for me to grapple with; I know my reasons why. What surprised me was how many of my non-Catholic friends, even those whose feelings toward the church are decisively negative, also expressed their care and concern.