Cardinal Sean O’Malley’s stunningly candid “60 Minutes” interview — tackling thorny subjects such as clergy sex abuse and ordination of women in the shadow of St. Peter’s — has made Boston’s archbishop the American face of an extraordinary papacy that takes tough questions and embraces criticism, in stark contrast to centuries of Vatican custom.

There was a “certain rawness” to O’Malley’s answers to Norah O’Donnell that typifies the papacy of Francis, said Dennis Doyle, professor of religious studies at the University of Dayton, a prominent Catholic research university in Ohio. “I think that there were signs that he was not completely prepped on what to say even. We weren’t getting canned answers on every issue. I do think that signals something about what Pope Francis is trying to model, and calling for.”

Boston College theologian the Rev. James Bretzke said O’Malley, the pope’s closest American advisor, has “gauged that now is the time when he can be a little more forthright.” Under prior papacies, he said, such candor “would have been certainly a nonstarter.”

Bretzke said what he saw was “confronto Americano” — or frank American-style discussion — which had largely been antithetical to the Vatican.

“In Italian, a confronto Americano is a bad thing,” Bretzke said. “And I think you could say now that the confronto Americano has become more the accepted style in Rome.”

O’Malley said the church “needs to address urgently” Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City, Mo., who remains in his position after pleading guilty to a criminal misdemeanor for not reporting a sexually abusive priest to authorities.

“We’re looking at how the Church could have protocols, how to respond when a bishop has not been responsible for the protection of children in his diocese,” O’Malley said. He also said he’d “love to have women priests” if he were founding his own church, “but Christ founded it” and “what he has given us is, is something different.”

The Rev. James Weiss of Boston College noted that Francis called on bishops last month to “say what you feel the Lord tells you to say ... without fear.”

“O’Malley is doing that,” Weiss said. Until O’Malley, he said, “No significant high churchmen have taken advantage of that permission. The American bishops are notoriously cowardly, and they just follow like sheep. This has been true for decades. This represents a new freedom.”

O’Malley’s interview appearance lit up Twitter, mostly with praise, but some were frustrated with his careful answer on female priests.

A skeptical Bernie McDaid, a local abuse survivor who met with Pope Benedict in 2009, said, “Clearly this pope is running a huge show of change. ... There’s no substance to this change other than words, in my opinion. And that’s how it’s always been.”

But Terry McKiernan, founder of BishopAccountability.org, said he’s “seeing a number of indications that the Vatican is paying more attention to this kind of thing, but much more attention needs to be paid to it.”