My last contribution to Good Faith Media before the conclave opened on Wednesday addressed the question, “Who Might Become Pope?” We now have the answer to that question.
Robert Francis Prevost, age 69, was born in Chicago. He has been a cardinal serving as prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and previously in ministry roles in Peru that included seminary professor, bishop, and ultimately archbishop.
Prevost was elected by the college of cardinals as pope in Thursday’s third round of voting (fourth round overall), on the afternoon of the second day of the conclave. He took the papal name Pope Leo XIV.
As many have noted, Pope Leo’s election represents multiple “firsts,” including the first pope from the United States and with Peruvian citizenship (He became a dual citizen, underscoring his identification with the people he served.), the first pope from North America (but the second from the Americas) and whose first language is English.
As a theological educator, I also note he is the first pope to be the product of an institution of undergraduate higher education in the United States—Villanova University. There, he studied mathematics and philosophy. (Former Villanova philosophy professor John Caputo posted on Facebook that the new pope was one of his students.)
He is also the first pope to have graduated from an institution accredited by the Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada, the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. He earned a Master of Divinity, which is the same degree program in which my own students are enrolled. And while he is not the only pope to have this as a previous role, Leo XIV was a seminary professor before he became a bishop.
I previously raised questions about the sort of pope whom the cardinals would elect. Would he be someone who would continue Pope Francis’ warm, open engagement?
There were immediate signs on Thursday afternoon that the answer to this question is “yes.” This isn’t necessarily in terms of personality, but in his identification with the paths taken by Francis’ papacy.
The name he chose is significant to this connection. Pope Leo XIII, who served as pope from 1878 until 1903, is the pope credited with launching what is now identified as “Catholic Social Teaching” with his 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum, or “Rights and Duties of Capital and Labor.” This encyclical was a response to the manner in which the industrial revolution at the end of the nineteenth century was harming people.
In his final encyclical, published in October 2024 Dilexit Nos, “On the Human and Divine Love of the Heart of Jesus,” Pope Francis appealed to Leo XIII in a crucial sentence: “As my Predecessor Leo XIII pointed out, through the image of his Sacred Heart, the love of Christ ‘moves us to return love for love.’”
I think that the connection to the legacy of Leo XIII made by the new pope’s choice of a name, combined with the echo in his Urbi et Orbi (“To the City and the World”) address from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica of Francis’ encouragement of communication that aims “to build bridges where many build walls,” was the new pope’s way of identifying with the emphases of Pope Francis without explicitly saying so.
There were two other key terms in Leo XIV’s opening address that made clear his intentions to continue on the trail blazed by Francis. One is “synodal.”
In another pre-conclave contribution, I identified this as a key question looming over the papal conclave: “Will the successor to Pope Francis continue and implement this emphasis on the Catholic Church as a communion of discernment that listens to all voices or will he offer qualifications or encourage redirections of the synodal path?”
I wrote about the background of that question in the “synodal path” embarked upon through Francis, when he convened the Synod on Synodality. This synod sought to listen to all voices within and beyond the Catholic Church in discerning how to move forward together on the path that leads to the future God desires for the church and the world. (The Greek word that supplies this term “synod” connotes something like “being together on the path.”)
Leo XIV declared in his address, “We want to be a synodal church, walking and always seeking peace, charity, closeness, especially to those who are suffering.” While at least one cardinal speaking in the pre-conclave daily congregations of the cardinals had explicitly condemned key aspects of Francis’ program of synodality, Leo XIV explicitly embraced it. “Walking” is also a key word in this context, as the Synod on Synodality characterized synodality as a path we walk together.
A related word that stuck out in the Italian in which Leo XIV spoke was “tutti,” which means “all,” “everyone,” or “everybody.” It appears no less than twelve times in the Italian text of his address.
It was a favorite word of Francis and it was a word strongly associated with his vision of a synodal path for the church as a church that includes everyone, listens to everyone, accompanies everyone, and is for everyone. The manner in which Pope Leo XIV will lead the Catholic Church on this path is not yet known, but his intention was clearly announced.
I will write more about the new pope after attending an audience he will hold with journalists on Monday.
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Professor of Historical Theology at Gardner-Webb University. Harmon is serving as a GFM correspondent for the papal conclave in Rome.
