If you’re an antitheist like me (technically agnostic as regards the existence of God, but hostile to organised religion), you may also have had mixed reactions to Pope Leo XIV’s visit to Spain this week. Regardless of how liberal a pope is said to be (and Leo is generally considered a moderate pontiff), he is still the head of a deeply conservative institution, whose members base their approach to complex societal issues on ancient texts. The pope, after all, is a Catholic - or is he?

Much was made in the international media this week of Leo’s agreement with Pedro Sánchez on issues such as immigration and war. But it should not be forgotten that, on key progressive causes, Leo is more in harmony with Vox than he is with the Spanish government - as any pope would have to be, without departing radically from Catholic dogma.

When Spain legalised same-sex marriage in 2005, it was only the third country in the world to do so, behind Belgium and the Netherlands. Spanish bishops reacted with horror, claiming that it devalued marriage and threatened familial stability. One even likened it to “imposing a virus on society, something false that will have negative consequences for social life.”

Unsurprisingly, there were no words of congratulation from Leo to Spain for being a pioneer in the field of gay rights. He is opposed to same-sex marriage, having previously advocated the official Catholic view that a family is “the stable union between a

man and a woman”. Leo has also strongly condemned abortion, the loosening of laws around which has been a key feature of Sánchez’s social programme.

Earlier this year, when asked what he thought of Donald Trump, Leo said that “it was impossible for the pope to enter into the affairs of individual countries”. The pontiff has clearly decided against such reticence, announcing upon his arrival in Madrid that Spain should “set aside the divisive and polarising narratives of [its] societal reality and history”. Coming from the head of an institution that has done so much to divide and polarise Spanish society over the centuries, that seemed a bit rich (although Leo did at least acknowledge that the Catholic church’s record on human rights is not untainted).

But the past is the past. Leo was right to say that “political pluralism should not degenerate into the constant disparagement of one’s adversary”. Polarisation in Spain has effectively rendered reasoned discussion impossible; instead, Sánchez and his opponents use the weekly session in congress to exchange insults and corruption allegations. Yet lawmakers clapped for seven minutes after Leo’s speech. Will they now swap diatribes for dialogue? If so, the pope’s intervention in Spanish affairs will have been a huge success.