After a brief however thrilling conclave, a plume of white smoke drifting from the Sistine Chapel on Thursday, Might 8 introduced the election of a brand-new pope. That pope is—drumroll, please—Robert Francis Prevost, now generally known as Leo XIV, who’s the first American pope within the Vatican’s historical past.
Initially from Chicago, and a graduate of Villanova College, Prevost is the top of the church’s Dicastery for Bishops (in different phrases, he selects new bishops) and holds twin citizenship within the US and Peru. Whereas Prevost has some extra conservative views—together with opposing the ordaining of ladies as deacons and a much less progressive file on LGBTQ+ rights than his predecessor, Pope Francis—he has additionally expressed assist for Venezuelan immigrants and has been described by a fellow priest as “the dignified center of the street.” Moreover, he’s “fairly the beginner tennis participant,” as Prevost revealed in an interview in 2023, additionally noting “studying, taking lengthy walks, and touring” as different pursuits.
100 and thirty-three cardinals labored tirelessly to decide on a head of the Catholic Church to interchange the late Pope Francis, and loads of fervor across the query in Vatican Metropolis; high candidates included Rome’s Matteo Zuppi, longtime Vatican secretary of state Pietro Parolin, and former archbishop of Manila Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle.