With His Remarks on Sexual Morality, a Surprise Pope Keeps on Surprising ROME - From the moment he was introduced to the huge crowds waiting for a new pope in the rain at St. Peter's Square, Pope Francis has been a surprise. People gasped when his name was called out. He was 76, seemingly another rigid conservative, not the younger, dynamic figure many Catholics had hoped for. Now six months later, the surprises keep coming, including the pope's new remarks that the church risked becoming a "small chapel" overly fixated on sexual morality and should instead offer a broader, more inclusive message. Francis is challenging the status quo of the Roman Catholic Church so determinedly and so unexpectedly that Vatican watchers are debating whether this is merely a change of tone, as many had thought at first. Some now think the pope may be making a deliberate effort to shake up the Vatican governing hierarchy, known as the Curia, and prepare the ground for a more fundamental shift in the direction of the church. "I think we are looking at major changes," said John Thavis, a longtime Vatican observer and author of "The Vatican Diaries." There is a lot of disorientation inside the Roman Curia. They used to feel they were in charge. Right now, they know they are not in charge. The latest unexpected jolt from Pope Francis came in an interview conducted with a Jesuit journalist and released Thursday in Jesuit publications around the world. Francis, himself a Jesuit, chastised the church's narrow focus on controversial social issues and called instead for a more merciful and less judgmental church. He had already sent out earlier signals, declining to live in the papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace, chiding prelates for driving fancy cars and announcing that church properties should be used as shelters for refugees. Francis did try to temper the impact of his remarks on Friday, telling an audience of Catholic gynecologists that abortion was a symptom of our "throwaway culture" and urging them to refuse to perform the procedure. But there seems little question that Francis wants to change the papal conversation. His predecessor, Benedict XVI, often seemed engaged in an angry verbal jousting match with secularism and modernity, usually delivered through formal encyclicals or speeches that, to many Catholics, felt like a personal rebuke. The church seemed like "a rigid institution dictating impossible norms to follow, an overly severe mother," said Lucetta Scaraffia, a scholar of Catholicism in Rome. By contrast, Pope Francis has made impromptu telephone calls to people who have written him letters seeking help, while also thriving on socializing with other priests and laypeople. He is assuming the tone of the parish priest, many analysts say, recognizing that people struggle daily with issues of conscience and that the church, rather than shake a finger, must offer a broader message of comfort and healing. Many analysts have seized on an analogy cited by Francis in his interview: the church as a hospital in a battlefield. "People have been wounded in a war over secularization," said Ms. Scaraffia, a history professor at the University of Rome La Sapienza. "He's saying: "Let's look after the wounds. That's more important than winning the war." " The deep challenges confronting the church became evident after Benedict's stunning decision to resign early this year. Allegations of mismanagement were erupting in the Vatican, and accusations of impropriety shook the Vatican bank. Many cardinals blamed the problems on the secretive administrative body, the Roman Curia, and wanted Benedict's successor to usher in major reforms that would decentralize power. Pope Francis has already signaled his independence from some of the Vatican's traditional channels, and his biggest governance move, as yet, has been the creation of an advisory group of eight outside cardinals to help him usher in Curial reform. But in his interview, he hinted that bigger changes could be coming, including possible structural changes to the conferences of bishops, known as synods. He also pointedly warned that certain departments in the Curia, when functioning poorly, risk "becoming institutions of censorship." Laurie Goodstein contributed reporting from New York.