The Pope didn't call for a crusade

Pope Francis' trip to South Korea memorialized the atrocities of the last century. On the way home, the Pope became embroiled in controversy about a conflict raging in the current one.

During a lengthy discussion, Francis remarked on the spread of cruelty and torture before being asked about violence against religious minorities in Iraq, and whether he approved of the U.S. bombing campaign aimed at stopping the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS. With what seemed careful deliberation, Pope Francis said: "In these cases where there is an unjust aggression, I can only say this: It is licit to stop the unjust aggressor. I underline the verb: stop. I do not say bomb, make war, I say stop by some means. With what means can they be stopped? These have to be evaluated. To stop the unjust aggressor is licit."

This response -- and the reaction to it -- says much about the complexity of running an organization that is at once modern and ancient, religious and political, international and parochial. But what exactly did he mean? Was he, as a few excitable writers suggested, calling for a new crusade? Certainly, much of the media response quickly fixated on what seemed to be approval for a military campaign and how a Pope -- the leader of the Catholic Church -- was seemingly sanctioning war against an Islamic caliphate.

Actually, he wasn't.

Crusading, as defined by most historians, generally involved taking religious vows to head east and assist in military expeditions against Islamic powers in exchange for spiritual rewards (redemption from sin). Historians have identified major campaigns as the First, Second, Third, etc. Crusades. In response to these conquests, the local Islamic powers leveraged the idea of jihad to rally disparate Muslim groups together.

Yet although the Crusades featured not just plenty of violence but also peaceful cross-cultural exchange, they aren't an example Francis wants to invoke. In fact, he isn't saying that anyone should take vows and go off to fight. Instead, Francis is making the point that taking action to stop evil is just.