VATICAN CITY – Catholic cardinals broke with tradition Thursday and elected the first U.S. pope, making Chicago-born missionary Robert Prevost the 267th pontiff to lead the Catholic Church in a moment of global turmoil and conflict.
Prevost, a 69-year-old member of the Augustinian religious order who spent his career ministering in Peru, took the name Leo XIV.
In his first words as Pope Francis’ successor, uttered from the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica, Leo said, “Peace be with you,” and emphasized a message of “a disarmed and disarming peace” dialogue and missionary evangelization.
He wore the traditional red cape and trappings of the papacy — a cape that Francis had eschewed on his election in 2013 — suggesting a return to some degree of tradition after Francis’ unorthodox pontificate. But in naming himself Leo, the new pope could also have wanted to signal a strong line of continuity: Brother Leo was the 13th century friar who was a great companion to St. Francis of Assisi, the late pope’s namesake.
“Together, we must try to find out how to be a missionary church, a church that builds bridges, establishes dialogue, that’s always open to receive — like on this piazza with open arms — to be able to receive everybody that needs our charity, our presence, dialogue and love,” Leo said in near-perfect Italian.
Prevost had been a leading candidate for the papacy, but there had long been a taboo against a U.S. pope, given the geopolitical power the country already wields. But Prevost was seemingly eligible because he’s also a Peruvian citizen and had lived for years in Peru, first as a missionary and then as bishop, and cardinals may have thought the 21st century world order could handle a U.S.-born pope.
Francis, history’s first Latin American pope, clearly had his eye on Prevost and in many ways saw him as his heir apparent. He sent Prevost to take over a complicated diocese in Peru, then brought him to the Vatican in 2023 to serve as the powerful head of the office that vets bishop nominations from around the world, one of the most important jobs in the Catholic Church. Earlier this year, Francis elevated Prevost into the senior ranks of cardinals, giving him prominence going into the conclave that few other cardinals had.
Since arriving in Rome, Prevost has kept a low public profile but was well-known to the men who count. Significantly, he presided over one of the most revolutionary reforms Francis made, when he added three women to the voting bloc that decides which bishop nominations to forward to the pope.
Prevost’s brother, John Prevost, described his brother as being very concerned for the poor and those who don’t have a voice, saying he expects him to be a “second Pope Francis.”
“He’s not going to be real far left and he’s not going to be real far right,” he added. “Kind of right down the middle.”
Celebrating the new pope
The crowd in St. Peter’s Square erupted in cheers Thursday when white smoke poured out of the Sistine Chapel shortly after 6 p.m. on the second day of the conclave, the most geographically diverse in history. Priests made the sign of the cross and nuns wept as the crowd shouted, “Viva il papa!”
Waving flags from around the world, tens of thousands of people waited for more than an hour to learn who had won and were surprised an hour later, when the senior cardinal deacon appeared on the loggia, said “Habemus Papam!” — “We have a pope!” in Latin — and announced the winner was Prevost.
He spoke to the crowd in Italian and Spanish, but not English, honoring Pope Francis and his final salute to the crowd on Easter Sunday.
“Greetings … to all of you, and in particular, to my beloved diocese of Chiclayo in Peru, where a faithful people have accompanied their bishop, shared their faith,” he said in Spanish.
U.S. President Donald Trump said it was “such an honor for our country” for the new pope to be American.
“What greater honor can there be?” he said. The president added that “we’re a little bit surprised and we’re happy.”
The last pope to take the name Leo was Leo XIII, an Italian who led the church from 1878 to 1903. That Leo softened the church’s confrontational stance toward modernity, especially science and politics and laid the foundation for modern Catholic social thought. His most famous encyclical, Rerum Novarum of 1891, addressed workers’ rights and capitalism at the beginning of the industrial revolution and was highlighted by the Vatican in explaining the new pope’s choice of name.
An Augustinian pope
Vatican watchers said Prevost’s decision to name himself Leo was particularly significant given the previous Leo’s legacy of social justice and reform, suggesting continuity with some of Francis’ chief concerns.
“He is continuing a lot of Francis’ ministry,’’ said Natalia Imperatori-Lee, the chair of religious studies at Manhattan University in the Bronx. But Imperatori-Lee also said his election could send a message to the U.S. church, which has been badly divided between conservatives and progressives, with much of the right-wing opposition to Francis coming from there.
“I think it is going to be exciting to see a different kind of American Catholicism in Rome,’’ Imperatori-Lee said.
Archbishop Bernard Hebda, of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, told reporters he never thought he would see an American pope, given the questions of how an one would navigate dealing with a U.S. president, especially Trump.
“How is it that the Holy Father is able to deal with President Trump, for example — whoever our American president? Would those ties be too close or too distant?” he said. “And so I just never imagined that we would have an American pope, and I have great confidence that Pope Leo will do a wonderful job of navigating that.”
Leo was expected to celebrate Mass with cardinals in the Sistine Chapel on Friday, planned to deliver his first Sunday noon blessing from the loggia of St. Peter’s and lined up an audience with the media Monday in the Vatican auditorium, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said.
Beyond that, he has a possible first foreign trip at the end of May: Francis had been invited to travel to Turkey to commemorate the 1,700th anniversary of the First Council of Nicaea, a landmark event in Christian history and an important moment in Catholic-Orthodox relations. Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, welcomed Leo’s election and said he hoped he would join the anniversary celebration.
The new pope was formerly the prior general, or leader, of the Order of St. Augustine, which was formed in the 13th century as a community of “mendicant” friars — dedicated to poverty, service and evangelization. Vatican News said Leo is the first Augustinian pope.
Prevost’s election thrilled American students studying in Rome who happened to be in St. Peter’s Square to witness history.
“That’s the first American pope in history. How exciting!” said Alessandra Jarrett, a 21-year-old political science student at Rome’s John Cabot university. “Crazy that we’re able to be here and see it, and this was even our last day in school.”
Sister Bernadette, a 50-year-old nun from Houston, Texas, was studying spirituality in Rome at the same university where Prevost did graduate studies, the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, known as the Angelicum.
“He touched the heart of everyone, and he acknowledged the great work of Francis, which he wants to continue embracing the world and embracing all of our brothers and sisters in Christ,” she said.
The past of Pope Leo
Francis moved Prevost from the Augustinian leadership back to Peru in 2014 to serve as the administrator and later bishop of Chiclayo.
He remained in that position, acquiring Peruvian citizenship in 2015, until Francis brought him to Rome in 2023 to assume both the bishops’ dossier and the presidency of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. In that job he would have kept in regular contact with the Catholic hierarchy in the part of the world that counts the most Catholics. Counting North, Central and South America, the region had 37 cardinal electors going into the conclave.
The bells of the cathedral in Peru’s capital of Lima and at Holy Name Cathedral in downtown Chicago tolled after Prevost’s election was announced. People outside the Lima cathedral said they wanted Prevost to visit.
“For us Peruvians, it is a source of pride that this is a pope who represents our country,” said elementary school teacher Isabel Panez, who happened to be near the cathedral when the news was announced. “We would like him to visit us here in Peru.”
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Giada Zampano, Helena Alves in Rome, Franklin Briceno in Lima, Peru and Colleen Barry in Schiavon, Italy contributed to this report.
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Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
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This story has corrected the number of Augustinian popes. Vatican News says Pope Leo XIV is the first Augustinian pope, not the seventh.
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