US cardinal Prevost is new pope, chooses name Leo XIV

Habemus Papam – Pope Leo XIV. (Photo: Catholic Church England and Wales/ Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

By Agenzia Nova, Philippine News Agency

ROME – US Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost was elected the new Pope on Thursday (local time), and has chosen the name Leo XIV.

The 133 cardinal electors have elected the 267th Roman Pontiff shortly after smoke came out of the chimney installed on the Sistine Chapel.

This was announced on the Loggia of Blessings in St. Peter’s Basilica by Cardinal Protodeacon Dominique Mamberti, with the formula “Annuntio vobis gaudium magnum, habemus Papam.”

The pontiff was elected on the fourth ballot, after the black smoke of Wednesday evening and Thursday morning.

Who is the new Pope? 

Prevost, OSA, Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, Archbishop-Bishop Emeritus of Chiclayo, was born on Sept. 14, 1955 in Chicago, Illinois, United States.

In 1977, he entered the novitiate of the Order of Saint Augustine (OSA) in the province of Our Lady of Good Counsel in Saint Louis. On Aug. 29, 1981, he professed solemn vows.

He studied at the Catholic Theological Union of Chicago, graduating in Theology.

At the age of 27, he was sent by the Order to Rome to study Canon Law at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (the Angelicum).

He was ordained a priest on June 19, 1982. He obtained a Licentiate in 1984, then was sent to work in the mission of Chulucanas in Piura, Peru (1985-1986).

In 1987, he obtained a Doctorate with the thesis, “The role of the local prior of the Order of Saint Augustine.”

In the same year, he was elected director of vocations and director of the missions of the Augustinian Province “Mother of Good Counsel” of Olympia Fields, Illinois.

In 1988, he was sent to the mission of Trujillo as director of the common formation project of the Augustinian aspirants of the Vicariates of Chulucanas, Iquitos, and Apurímac.

There he was prior of the community (1988-1992), director of formation (1988-1998) and teacher of the professed (1992-1998).

In the Archdiocese of Trujillo, he was judicial vicar (1989-1998), professor of Canon, Patristic and Moral Law at the Major Seminary “San Carlos y San Marcelo.”

In 1999, he was elected Prior Provincial of the “Mother of Good Counsel” Province (Chicago).

After two and a half years, the Ordinary General Chapter elected him Prior General, a ministry that the Order entrusted to him again in the Ordinary General Chapter of 2007.

In October 2013, he returned to Chicago to be teacher of the professed and Provincial Vicar, positions he held until Pope Francis appointed him, on Nov. 3, 2014, Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Chiclayo (Peru), elevating him to the episcopal dignity of Titular Bishop of the Diocese of Sufar.

On Nov. 7, he took canonical possession of the Diocese in the presence of the Apostolic Nuncio James Patrick Green; he was ordained Bishop on Dec. 12, the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, in the Cathedral of his Diocese.

He has been bishop of Chiclayo since Sept. 26, 2015. Since March 2018, he has been second vice president of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference. Pope Francis appointed him a member of the Congregation for the Clergy in 2019 and a member of the Congregation for Bishops in 2020.

On April 15, 2020, the Pope appointed him Apostolic Administrator of the diocese of Callao.

Since Jan. 30, 2023, he has been Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America.

On Feb. 6, 2025, the Holy Father Francis promoted him to the Order of Bishops, assigning him the Title of the Suburbicarian Church of Albano. Created and proclaimed Cardinal by Pope Francis in the Consistory of Sept. 30, 2023 of the Deaconry of Santa Monica.

He is a member of the Dicasteries: for Evangelization, Section for the first evangelization and the new particular Churches; for the Doctrine of the Faith; for the Eastern Churches; for the Clergy; for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life; for Culture and Education; for Legislative Texts; of the Pontifical Commission for the Vatican City State.