MODESTO, Calif. – Grass-roots organizing that seeks to overcome what Pope Francis has called "the economy of exclusion" is vital to the work of the Catholic Church, said an Argentine attorney who has stayed friends with the pontiff for a decade.

VATICAN CITY – An economic vision geared solely toward profit and material well-being has led to an economy of exclusion and inequality that has increased poverty and the number of people discarded "as unproductive and useless," Pope Francis said.