Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost becomes Pope Leo XIV

Image Courtesy of Fox News

By Zachary Lichter

This past week, Catholics all over the world had their eyes on the Vatican. 133 Cardinals from all over the world came together on May 8 in Vatican City for the Conclave, where they voted  in the Sistine Chapel on who would be the new successor of St. Peter. After voting four times, white smoke came out of the chimney of the Sistine Chapel during the fourth round when the Cardinals elected Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost on May 8 as Pope Leo XIV. He chose the papal name Leo after Pope Leo XIII because of his teachings on social justice.

While there were many papal candidates that looked like front runners, Cardinal Prevost came to the world as a shock because he is the first pope from the United States. Many American Catholics believed that there would never be an American pope because the U.S. is a superpower politically. However, the Holy Spirit works in mysterious ways, and it saw something in Cardinal Prevost that guided the 132 Cardinals to vote for him.

Cardinal Prevost was born on September 14, 1955 in Chicago. When he was in first grade, he dreamed of becoming a priest and played Mass with his two older brothers using his mother’s ironing board and a white table cloth as an altar. In 1977, he graduated from Villanova University with a Bachelor’s degree in math. He then entered the Augustianian order where he completed his formation in the Augustinian Province of Our Lady of Good Counsel.

Prevost was ordained a priest on June 19, 1982 as Father Bob in the Augustinian College of Saint Monica in Rome. He joined the Augustinian mission in Chulucanas, Peru in 1985, where he served as the chancellor of the Territorial Prelature of Chulucanas. In 1987, he returned to the U.S. where he served as the vocation director and mission director of the Augustinian Province of Our Lady of Good Counsel in Olympia Fields, Illinois.

Father Bob returned to Peru in 1988 where he served as a missionary priest. During his time in Peru he was a formation director and judicial vicar. He was a canon law and moral theology professor at the Augustinian Seminary in Trujillo. While serving the people of the Archdiocese of Trujillo, he served the poor and was entrusted to give pastoral care.

In 1999, he moved back to Chicago where he served as the Prior Provincial of the Augustinian Province of Our Lady of Good Counsel. Father Bob became the Prior General of the Augustinian order from 2001. He came back to his province in 2013 to serve as the Director of Formation at the St. Augustine Convent in Chicago.

On November 3, 2014, the late Pope Francis appointed Father Bob as the new Bishop of the Peruvian Diocese of Chicaylo. He was ordained a bishop on December 12, 2014 as Bishop Prevost. While he was a bishop, he served as the Vice President of the Peruvian Bishops Council from 2018 to 2023. Bishop Prevost was called to Rome as the Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, which promoted him to Archbishop. On September 30, 2023, Archbishop Prevost was created a Cardinal by the late Pope Francis.

Two years later on May 8, 2025, Cardinal Robert Prevost became Pope Leo XIV. He came out of the balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square addressing thousands of people as their new Holy Father. Time will tell what his papacy will look like, but like his predecessors, he will serve the Church with zeal, holiness, and reverence.