Meet the new pope: Robert Prevost, Pope Leo XIV

Newly elected Pope Leo XIV appears at the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, Thursday, May 8, 2025. | AP Photo/Andrew Medichini

VATICAN CITY — Cardinal Robert Prevost, a missionary who spent his career ministering in Peru and leads the Vatican’s powerful office of bishops, was elected the first American pope in the 2,000-year history of the Catholic Church.

Prevost, 69, took the name Leo XIV.

READ: New pope elected as white smoke billows from chimney of Sistine Chapel

White smoke poured from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and the great bells of St. Peter’s Basilica tolled Thursday, May 8, 2025, after cardinals elected the 267th pope to lead the Catholic Church on the second day of their conclave.

Pope Leo XIV, First American pope

Prevost, a missionary who spent his career ministering in Peru and leads the Vatican’s powerful office of bishops. was elected the first American pope in the 2,000-year history of the Catholic Church.

Pope Leo XIV appeared on the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica wearing the traditional red cape of the papacy — a cape that Pope Francis had eschewed on his election in 2013.

Prevost had been a leading candidate except for his nationality. There had long been a taboo against a U.S. pope, given the geopolitical power already wielded by the United States in the secular sphere. But Prevost, a Chicago native, was seemingly eligible also because he’s a Peruvian citizen and lived for years in Peru, first as a missionary and then as an archbishop.

Francis clearly had his eye on Prevost and in many ways saw him as his heir apparent. He brought Prevost 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. As a result, Prevost had a prominence going into the conclave that few other cardinals have.

Pope Leo XIV’s first words

In his first words, Pope Leo XIV, history’s first American pope Robert Prevost, said “Peace be with you.”

From the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica, he recalled that he was an Augustinian priest, but a Christian above all, and a bishop, “so we can all walk together.”

He spoke in Italian and then switched to Spanish, recalling his many years spent as a missionary and then archbishop of Chiclayo, Peru.