VATICAN CITY — Pope Leo XIV, Chicago-born Robert Prevost, was installed Sunday as the first American pope.
He vowed to work for unity so that the Catholic church becomes a sign of peace in the world, offering a message of communion during an inaugural Mass in St. Peter’s Square before an estimated 200,000 pilgrims, presidents, patriarchs and princes.
Leo officially opened his pontificate by taking his first popemobile tour through the piazza, a rite of passage that has become synonymous with the papacy’s global reach. The 69-year-old Augustinian missionary smiled and waved from the back of the truck.
Many friends and colleagues from Prevost’s time in Chicago and elsewhere were on hand for his installation, and others traveled from around the world to be there.
As Leo pulled into view, standing in the popemobile as it pulled in to St. Peter’s Square shortly after 9 a.m. Rome time Sunday, cheers went up from members of his religious order, the Augustinians, many from the Chicago area, who were seated near the front of the square below the main liturgical stage.
“Augustinian!” some shouted.
Others stood on chairs craning their necks for a better view, holding up cellphones and cameras.
The Rev. John Lydon, 69, who lives in Hyde Park and was the pope’s roommate for a decade in Peru, stood on his chair, facing away from St. Peter’s Basilica, his eyes trained on his old friend. His lips moving as if in prayer.
When Pope Leo passed by in the popemobile, like most of the Augustinians around him, the Rev. Homero Sanchez, pastor of Chicago’s St. Rita of Cascia parish, stood and cheered. But then he sat down, the black hood, or capuche, of his liturgical robe pulled over his head to protect it from the blazing Roman sun. He looked like he was praying.
When asked if he was worried about his friend, who he has known since 2008, he said, simply: “No.”
What was Sanchez’s prayer for the pope?
“That he would be open to the Holy Spirit,” Sanchez said after the installation ended. “He’s the pope, but he’s our brother, so of course I am going to pray for him every day.”
Susan Hanssen, a professor who was born in Chicago and recently arrived in Rome to teach, said she thought Leo’s homily of unity would resonate in the United States and beyond.
“I think he will inspire,” Hanssen said after the inaugural Mass. “What I particularly loved was the phrasing — unity within the doctrine of the faith and then in love.”
Gregory and Susan Hudak, who lived for 40 years in the Chicago area, found themselves in Rome after booking a trip in February, with just a faint hope of perhaps glimpsing the pope. Seeing the popemobile pass in front of them, with Leo on board, was even better than watching Michael Jordan play, said Gregory Hudak, a former altar boy wearing a Bears hat.
“Originally, the only hope I had coming here was to see the inside of the Sistine Chapel,” Gregory Hudak said. “Seeing the pope was not scheduled. It was a long-shot hope. And this was a treasure, simple as that.”
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During the Mass, Leo appeared to choke up when the two potent symbols of the papacy were placed on him — the lambswool stole over his shoulders and the fisherman’s ring on his finger — as if the weight of responsibility of leading the 1.4 billion-strong church had just sunk in.
He turned his hand to look at the ring and seal, then clasped his hands in front of him in prayer.
Vice President JD Vance, one of the last foreign officials to see Pope Francis before he died, led the U.S. delegation honoring Leo after paying his respects at the Argentine pope’s tomb upon arriving in Rome late Saturday.
In his homily, Leo said he wanted to be a servant to the faithful through the two dimensions of the papacy, love and unity, so that the church could be a force for peace in the world.
“I would like that our first great desire be for a united church, a sign of unity and communion, which becomes a leaven for a reconciled world,” he said. “In this our time, we still see too much discord, too many wounds caused by hatred, violence, prejudice, the fear of difference and an economic paradigm that exploits the earth’s resources and marginalizes the poorest.”
His call for unity was significant, given the polarization in the Catholic church in the United States and beyond.
Francis’ 12-year pontificate, which emphasized care for the poor and marginalized and disdain for the capitalist economic system, often alienated conservatives and traditionalists.
Leo’s May 8 election by the College of Cardinals, after a remarkably quick 24-hour conclave, appears to have pleased conservative Catholics who seem to appreciate his more disciplined, traditional style and Augustinian background, emphasizing core truths of Catholic doctrine.
Leo drove that message home by wearing the formal red cape of the papacy, or mozzetta, to receive Vance and official government delegations in the basilica.
Francis had eschewed many of the formalities of the papacy as part of his simple style. But Leo’s return to the traditional garb has pleased conservatives and traditionalists who cheered when he came out of the loggia after the conclave wearing the red cape.
“Let us build a church founded on God’s love, a sign of unity, a missionary church that opens its arms to the world, proclaims the word, allows itself to be made restless by history and becomes a leaven of harmony for humanity,” Leo said Sunday, making reference to some of the themes of Francis’ pontificate, as well.
Strict diplomatic protocol dictated the seating arrangements at the Mass, with the delegations from the United States and Peru getting front-row seats thanks to Leo’s dual citizenship.
Vance, a Catholic convert who tangled with Francis over the Trump administration’s mass migrant deportation plans, was joined by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who arrived in Rome ahead of time to try to advance the Russia-Ukraine peace talks.
President Dina Boluarte of Peru was one of about a dozen heads of state attending, as was Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Russia had planned to send its culture minister but was represented by its ambassador, reports said.
Diplomatic protocol also dictated the dress code: Most guests wore black, but the handful of Catholic queens and princesses — Letizia of Spain and Charlene of Monaco, among others — wore white in a special privilege allowed them.
Three dozen of the world’s other Christian churches sent their own delegations. The Jewish community had a 13-member delegation, half of them rabbis. Other representatives headed Buddhist, Muslim, Zoroastrian, Hindu, Sikh and Jain delegations.
Security was tight, as it was for Francis’ funeral on April 26, which drew an estimated 250,000 people. The Vatican said 200,000 were on hand Sunday in the piazza and surrounding streets, parks and piazzas, where giant television screens and portable toilets were set up.
At the end of the Mass, Leo expressed hope for negotiations to bring a “just and lasting peace” in Ukraine and offered prayers for the people of Gaza — children, families and elderly who are “reduced to hunger,” he said. Leo made no mention of hostages taken by Hamas from southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, as Francis usually did when praying for Gaza.
Among those who came to see the new pope, U.S. seminarian Ethan Menning, 21, from Omaha, Nebraska, wrapped himself in an American flag, purchased at a truck stop in Iowa, to celebrate.
“Rome always felt like home for a Catholic, but now coming here and seeing one of our own on the throne of Peter … it almost makes Jesus himself more accessible,” he said.
The two symbols of the papacy handed to Leo were the pallium stole and the fisherman’s ring. The pallium, draped across his shoulders, symbolizes the pastor carrying his flock as the pope carries the faithful. The ring, which becomes Leo’s official seal, symbolizes Jesus’ call to the apostle Peter to cast his fishing nets.
The other symbolically important moment of the Mass was the representational rite of obedience to Leo. In the past, all cardinals would vow obedience to the new pope, but more recent papal installations involve representatives of cardinals, bishops, priests, deacons, nuns, married couples and young people participating in the rite.
Leo also has identified the challenges to humanity posed by artificial intelligence, making the parallel to the challenges to human dignity posed by the industrial revolution that were confronted by his namesake, Pope Leo XIII, who was pope from 1878 to 1903.
Since he was elected pontiff, there has been a spotlight on Pope Leo XIV’s south suburban hometown of Dolton, his boyhood home and the church his family attended.
The Catholic Theological Union on the South Side — where the pope studied — has also been brought into the limelight, and several CTU officials and alums were in attendance Sunday.
Nicole Winfield is AP religion writer. Cathleen Falsani was the Sun-Times religion reporter and columnist from 2000-2010.