It’s time for a Black pope for the Catholic Church. Actually, it’s way past time.

Gerald Davis, along with his wife, daughter, and grandson, had the great honor of walking to the altar and presenting the offertory gifts to Pope Francis during the 2015 Mass at the Cathedral Basilica of Sts. Peter and Paul.

A decade later, he stills speaks with awe about coming face to face with the pontiff. His grandson, who was 12 at the time, told him afterward that he felt transformed by the experience. “It was just an amazing moment,” Davis recalled.

With Francis’ death on Monday, the 83-year-old can’t help but wonder what’s next for the Catholic Church, and whether now might be the time for cardinals to consider selecting a person of color to lead it.

“The Holy Spirit will direct that effort, and I share the feeling with a number of my brethren that the church needs to be, at the highest levels, as diverse as the church is becoming,” said Davis, a member of the Archbishop’s Commission on Racial Healing in Philadelphia.

As a lifelong Catholic myself, I’m hoping for the same thing. There would be no better way for the church to demonstrate its commitment to racial inclusivity than by naming a Black pope. It would make a profound statement — not just in the United States, where President Donald Trump has demonized diversity, equity, and inclusion, but around the world.

Increasing diversity at the highest level of the Catholic faith will help more people connect to it.

The growth of the Catholic Church in Africa has been impressive, with Vatican officials estimating that 20% of all Catholics worldwide live on the continent. Religious vocations are also up there. Other areas, such as Brazil, the Caribbean, or the United States, may not have experienced equivalent growth in the number of new Catholics, but have sizable Catholic populations.

Although it’s believed several popes in the first millennia might have been born in North Africa, or at least had an ancestral tie to the continent, there hasn’t been one from that part of the world in more than a thousand years.

Surely, if church leaders are as committed to further growth as they profess, they will strongly consider candidates from somewhere other than Europe.

“It’s something I would love to see,” said Nate Tinner-Williams, a cofounder and editor of the Black Catholic Messenger. “I think the cardinals are going to do something we don’t expect.”

Tinner-Williams added: “It could be someone from Asia, or another person from South America. Who knows? But I would love to see a Black pope because it’s something that would represent even more progress for the Catholic Church, that it doesn’t have to be a white person, which we know in our heads, but we haven’t seen with our own eyes.”

Back when I was a parochial school student, I used to gaze at all the imagery depicting a white Jesus with long straight hair and wonder, “Is that what he really looked like?”

Scholars and theologians now agree that, given where he lived, Jesus likely had a darker complexion and more textured hair than the way he is commonly depicted. Increasing diversity at the highest level of the Catholic faith will help more people connect with it.

There are several African church leaders considered among those who are “popeable.” They include Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, 76, of Ghana, who has recently spoken out against the criminalization of homosexuality in his native country. Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, 65, the archbishop of Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, is also a contender. Cardinal Robert Sarah of Guinea is among the most conservative candidates.

Then there’s Cardinal Wilton Gregory, archbishop emeritus of Washington, D.C. In 2020, he became the first and only African American cardinal, but he’s a long shot, as is Cardinal Chibly Langlois, the first and only Haitian cardinal in the Caribbean country’s history.

If the Oscar-nominated movie Conclave taught us anything, it’s that there are an awful lot of variables and politicking that go into the selection of a pontiff. Anything could happen behind those closed doors. We won’t know the result until white smoke literally emerges from the Sistine Chapel, indicating the cardinal electors have reached a decision.

“The year 2025 would be a magnificent year if, with all of the other stuff that’s happening, the Catholic Church says, ‘Uh-uh, that’s wrong, treating people as if they are less than. We have decided that we want a person of color — perhaps one from Africa — that can lead 1.4 billion,’” Davis said.

From his lips to God’s ears.