Sinead O'Connor: She shocked the world by ripping up a photo of the Pope—but then, many Catholics changed their minds.

There’s a particularly famous moment from the life of the pop-punk icon Sinéad O’Connor, who died at age 56 on Wednesday. “Had the Catholic Church heeded Sinead O’Connor eleven years before the Spotlight revelations in Boston, taken her protest as an opportunity to face some hard truths, the church would be in a better position today,” a Chicago theologian, who asked to remain anonymous, wrote to me in a message. “Sinead O’Connor was so ahead of her time,” said Brenna Moore, a theology professor at Fordham University. “Decades and decades ahead of her time.” Related From Slate This Movie About One of Our Most Controversial Pop Stars Shows We’ve Still Got a Lot of Reassessing to Do O’Connor had explained the protest as relating to sex abuse in the church, but at the time, “no one was saying, ‘well, maybe she has a point,’ ” Keane said. Keane said that the church does not teach that popes are above reproof and that many people would criticize John Paul II today, “but at the same time, the unofficial line is how dare you say that about a saint.” Bill Donohue of the Catholic League led the public charge against O’Connor back in 1992; on Wednesday, he put out a statement trashing O’Connor as violent, stupid, and “certifiably crazy.” Still, it’s not at all taboo for Catholics today to voice their love for O’Connor.