I feel like if he got thwacked sufficiently hard by some great global crisis he might pull a Pius IX and become very Trad and reactionary. He's got the theological chops for it with his intensive study of the Church Fathers.

Right now he feels like he's cruising for a bruising. He talks about "unity" and peace, and uniting the Church, it feels like God is just lining him up to suffer some enormous disillusioning defeat that permanently alters what he thought his papacy was going to be.

Francis always had bravado and a sense of self-direction that resisted the correction of events. Leo doesn't feel like that. Leo feels like he has a direction he wants but is not really strong enough to maintain it in the face of events derailing his agenda.