God, money, influence: Philly-based Papal Foundation leader talks about challenges facing Pope Leo

Since December, Ward Fitzgerald of Haverford has been president of the board of the $250 million-asset, Philadelphia-based Papal Foundation, which backs pope-approved education, hospital, and church projects for war refugees and people living in poverty, and other projects backed by nuncios, the pope’s national ambassadors.

Fitzgerald, a top officer of former real estate giant Liberty Property Trust, later founded Exeter Property Trust, whose investors include Pennsylvania pensions. He sold Exeter in 2020 for $1.9 billion and started a new investment firm, ExCorde Capital; ExCorde means “from the heart.”

He offered observations on American Catholics and the challenges facing newly elected Pope Leo XIV, the former Cardinal Robert F. Prevost, a Peruvian American Augustinian priest and Villanova University graduate. Fitzgerald’s comments were edited for clarity and brevity.

I am humbled to serve. We’re called Stewards of St. Peter [the first pope]. The foundation does not contribute directly to the Vatican but to schools and homes — for girls who are trafficked and boys who had been targeted to smuggle drugs, for migrants and refugees and humanitarian needs in war-torn areas, for priests and sisters to advance their education in Rome.

The [donors] are good and generous people who want to serve the poor, the marginalized, the vulnerable, which we heard a lot about from Pope Francis and will under Pope Leo.

The fund was set up a little less than 40 years ago by the late John Cardinal Krol of Philadelphia and Pope John Paul II to do this good and holy work. Most of the [contributors] also give funds to Catholic charities — to our alma maters like Villanova [Fitzgerald went to Notre Dame] and to local parishes. Supporting the church in emerging nations, we can touch the world through eyes and ears and hearts in so many places, in thousands of parishes responding to hundreds of bishops.

My wife, Kathy, and I met him in Rome last April at a Papal Foundation dinner. I do not know him well. Our encounters were brief in a crowded room.

We don’t get to define him; he defines himself. He’s named himself Leo — there’s a lot in that. The last Leo was the pope who sent Mother Cabrini’s mission to the United States, as you saw in Eustace Wolfington’s movie last year. Leo signed the charter to start Catholic University of America, which is run by the laity.

Philadelphia is the historic home of American labor; Leo was the first pope who suggested it was right and just to form labor unions. But he also believed in individual property rights, not socialist ownership of everything. Workers deserve representation and protection; capitalism was appropriate for commerce.

As a leader of the Augustinian order, he was influenced by the writings and witness of St. Augustine and by St. Thomas Aquinas.

Aquinas looked at faith and reason. He wrote about how Aristotle and Socrates and Plato explain so much but can’t explain everything. Augustine in one of his most famous quotes told of how we are all restless until we rest in the Lord. We are all created by God, but people are looking for truth. They are nervous and anxious and can’t find it until they find the Lord. That faith is the foundation of Pope Leo.

I would not refer to him as a conservative or a liberal. He’s rooted in tradition and in the foundation of the faith and the great minds in the history of the world. The persons who promulgate themselves as conservatives or progressives need to find their way to the church. There’s one truth; there’s one church.

The pope has an opportunity to reach out to the laity, the 80% who are not in the pews. Maybe they’re not ready to come back in the door, but they need to participate. To abdicate your responsibility to be Christlike and perform works of mercy is irresponsible.

The church is universal. Pope Benedict said salvation will be had in as many ways as there are people. People come from many places. The yearning exists in everyone’s heart.

What the pope will do — because he was given grace, which is why he was selected — will be to make the church attractive to the world. He has a unique way to do it with a little bit of American style. America has been attractive to the world.

When someone who’s a world leader like Vance quotes a church doctor, the pope is going to have something to say about it. I don’t think [Prevost] did it out of bitterness or politics. When a church doctor is quoted, the pope is obligated to respond. It’s about theology, not policy.

I don’t believe the pope should get involved in that or insist that nations use their budgetary fiscal resources for any specific charity or work of the country that might influence the church.

Clearly, USAID has saved lives. But so have missiles.

This is a very difficult position. If the politicians want to talk theology, the church will respond. But if the politicians are making policy that affects the church, the church should have to adapt and figure out a way to deal with it, like everyone else.

The laity, while they have a role to play, I don’t know that we all understand the issues enough to really do that. Most laity think they do. But very few laity are theologians.

The Papal Foundation should not, nor should other charitable organizations, enter the dialogue about [who should be bishops]. It’s not our role to lead.