Witness to History
- Avery Copeland
- Sep 26
- 3 min read
Dr. Steven Harmon's Scholarship on Christian Unity Leads to Covering Election of Pope Leo XIV
BY JACKIE BRIDGES
At 6:08 p.m. on May 8 in Rome, Gardner-Webb University professor of historical theology, Steven Harmon, sat in the Holy See Press Office keeping an eye on the “chimney cam.” When white smoke appeared a few seconds later, he sprinted outside. “I jumped a couple of barricades (the press badge lets you get away with a lot here) to get into the middle of the street leading out into
the square,” Harmon wrote in his “Vatican Dispatch” for Good Faith Media.
Harmon’s eyewitness account of the papal conclave and the opportunity to cover this history-making event was the culmination of years of research, writing and dialogue on ecumenism—the effort to seek unity among different and often-divided Christian traditions.
Whether reporting from the Vatican, preaching from the pulpit, teaching behind a lectern or writing a scholarly book or article, his goal has always been the same: Unity in the body of Christ.
“I’m seeking to help people be more intentional about being more honest with each other about our differences,” Harmon asserted. “Not so we can figure out who’s right and who’s wrong, but so that we can recognize what we do have in common that we can build upon as a foundation.”
A prolific author, Harmon received the Scholarship Faculty Award in 2024-25. Since 2003, he has authored five books and edited two, and two more volumes will be available soon. He is co-editor of the forthcoming “The Oxford Handbook of Baptist Studies” from Oxford University Press, and his book, “Vision Over Visibility: U2’s Theological Imagination,” is under contract with Cascade Books.
His scholarly work led to an invitation to participate in international meetings between the Baptist World Alliance (BWA) and the Catholic Church. Through these ongoing Baptist-Catholic dialogues, Harmon met Pope Benedict and Pope Francis, and caught glimpses of the men behind the titles.
Pope Benedict was a theologian at heart, Harmon shared. When the group mentioned they had read and discussed one of his commentaries, “he leaned forward in his chair, his eyes brightened, and he was not the pope,” Harmon described. “He was a career academic, who had just realized that this many decades later, someone was actually reading something he had written.”
At the first meeting with Pope Francis, he asked the Baptist leaders to pray for him and for unity among the body of believers in Christ. The second meeting in 2022 happened after the Argentinian soccer team advanced to the World Cup finals. “When he came into the audience hall, (Pope Francis) recognized a Catholic theologian from Argentina and he said, ‘Jorge, we did well, didn’t we?’” Harmon related. Pope Francis also accepted a copy of Harmon’s book, “Baptists, Catholics, and the Whole Church: Partners in the Pilgrimage to Unity.”
When Pope Francis became ill in February 2025, Harmon was asked by Baptist World Global and Spectrum Local News to share his thoughts and prayers for the pope.
Two months later, as the world mourned the pope’s death, Harmon again shared his memories and analysis with news outlets across the country. He was intrigued with the possibility of reporting from Rome on the papal conclave and pitched the idea to Mitch Randall, the executive director of Good Faith Media.
Randall liked the idea, and they applied for temporary media credentials, made travel arrangements, and Harmon arrived in Rome on May 4. Harmon provided analysis based on his studies and meetings with Catholic leaders. Such as the Second Vatican Council that met in the early 1960s. “Those who held almost dissenting perspectives were not excommunicated; they were making contributions to the formulation of Catholic doctrine through their disagreement on the way to finding agreement,” Harmon stated.
Pope Francis’ The Synod on Synodality is another example. Harmon defined it as a “theological way to talk about a church being on the path together toward God’s intentions for the church and for the world.” He added, “They’ve been emphasizing a church that listens to all voices.”
In Pope Leo’s speech from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica—just an hour after the conclave released white smoke—he used the word, synodal. “It was quite striking,” Harmon observed. “It was clear that the pre-conclave conversations wanted a church that was synodal in that way. They wanted someone who would continue the trajectory of Pope Francis, and it seems clear that is what they did in electing Robert Francis Prevost as Pope Leo XIV.”
Avery Copeland contributed to this story.
pg. 22-23
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