“Peace be with you all.” — Pope Leo XIV, Urbi et Orbi, May 8, 2025
Elected pope, Robert Francis Prevost chose the name Leo XIV. He is the first American pontiff. He stands in continuity with Francis—though he is no replica. It will be up to him to clarify whether he intends to continue that momentum or to reorient the path. He inherits a Church in transition. He will have to decide whether to embody a lucid continuity or a veiled rupture.
Born in 1955 in Chicago to modest roots, Prevost entered the Order of Saint Augustine. He spent over twenty years as a missionary in Peru. There, he led a seminary, then a diocese. He knows the ground, the poverty, the political tensions. His authority does not come from office, but from long pastoral experience. He later returned to Rome, led his order, and joined the Curia. In 2023, Francis appointed him to one of the Church’s most strategic posts: Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops. Alongside the pope, he shaped the global episcopate. This is no secondary role—it is a central lever.
His trajectory makes him a prepared pope. He knows the workings of Rome. He reads power dynamics. He manages internal balances. Yet he has never been a public figure. Not a preacher, not a writer, not a polemicist. He is a man of files, of structures, of loyalty.
His election was swift. Four ballots, according to reports. That’s few. It signals the cardinals’ will for balance. They sought a name that reassures without stagnation, a profile that unites without provocation. A steady man. Formed, known, and predictable.
But predictability doesn’t answer the central question: what will Leo XIV do? He follows a pope who reshaped the Catholic landscape. Francis shifted priorities: the peripheries, ecology, synodality, collegial governance. He opened debates on authority, abuse, transparency, and the role of women. He angered conservatives, at times unsettled progressives, yet maintained a political voice in a fractured world.
Leo XIV follows all that. And there is no certainty he will pick up every open file. The temptation would be to stabilize without advancing, to preserve without engaging. This is not a judgment of intention. It is a structural fact: the Roman Curia absorbs momentum. The new pope will have to resist that inertia—or embody it.
His choice of name is no coincidence. Leo XIII was the pope of social doctrine, with his 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum, which laid the foundation of the Church’s social teaching. Leo I, the pope of the Council of Chalcedon, affirmed the full divinity and humanity of Christ, and established the doctrinal authority of the bishop of Rome in the universal Church—a role recognized there, whereas the earlier Council of Nicaea had affirmed unity of faith without resolving Roman primacy. Two figures of firmness, of structure, of doctrine. By placing himself under their names, Leo XIV signals a line of responsibility, centrality, and stability.
But he will not be able to sidestep the urgencies. The Church has not closed the file on abuse. It has yet to clarify the role of the laity in governance. It has not settled the liturgical question. It remains confronted by enduring fractures—between North and South, between doctrine and pastoral practice, between institution and grassroots.
Leo XIV comes with a solid background—shaped by the field, by service, and by Francis’ trust, of whom he was a key figure. And by thorough theological and canonical training: he holds a doctorate in canon law. He follows a dense pontificate, often divisive, always decisive. He inherits a Church under tension, but still alive, still capable of listening and of initiative. He will not solve everything. But he can set a course, hold a line, and carry forward what ought to be continued. A pope does not walk alone. But the way he walks matters.
See also: Pope Francis, a voice that resonated across the world
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