Pope Leo XIV - a biography

                  

Born: September 14, 1955 in Chicago, Illinois, USA

Ordained priest June 19, 1982

Consecrated Bishop: December 12, 2014

Elevated to Cardinal: September 30, 2023

Elected Pope: May 8, 2025

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost was elected after 4 votes on May 8, 2025, taking the name of Leo XIV. He has a missionary spirit, who travelled around the world being the Augustinian prior general of the order. He had to visit all the various communities belonging to the Augustinian order, including Malta. He also visited Malta recently when they had a meeting among various bishops and celebrated Mass at the Mosta basilica. His missionary spirit was emphasized by the fact that he spoke in fluent Italian, also in Spanish but didn’t say a work in English – which comes to show that he has a different vision about his mission at hand.

 

Childhood photos of Robert Prevost - click on each photo to enlarge

The Prevost family — Louis, an educator, Mildred, a librarian, and their sons Louis, John and Robert — were well-known at bustling St. Mary of the Assumption as dedicated and devout musicians, altar boys, lectors and volunteers, growing up in the southern edge of Chicago. Robert’s education took him to several schools which have all since closed, Mendel College Prep High School, where Prevost and his mother worked; St. Augustine Seminary High School in Michigan; Tolentine College in Olympia Fields, the suburb where he briefly lived; and Mount Carmel Elementary School in Chicago Heights, where his father was principal. His mother was also well educated, receiving a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Education. Two of her sisters were nuns. All their peers remember both parents as very hard-working in the parish, in the sacristy, parish choirs, fund-raising. Robert’s classmates refer to him as  the ‘smartest student in the class.’ He then left home for St. Augustine Seminary High School, also run by priests in the Order of St. Augustine, then went on to Villanova University, outside Philadelphia, for an undergraduate degree in mathematics. In 1977, he graduated, joined the Augustinians and began work toward his master of divinity degree at the Catholic Theological Union in Hyde Park. He also received both a licentiate and doctorate in canon law from the Pontifical College of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome. His doctoral thesis was on “The role of the local prior in the Order of Saint Augustine.”

Since taking his vows, though, Prevost has spent most of his career overseas.  He was ordained a priest on June 19, 1982 in Rome. Fr. Robert was sent in 1985 to Peru as a missionary, community prior and professor. He was consecrated Bishop on December 12, 2014. In 1999, Prevost was elected the head of the Augustinians' Chicago-based province. And then in 2001, he tapped as prior general of the worldwide order, which he led until 2013. During that time, he was based in Rome but spent most of his time on the road and in the air, visiting the nearly 50 countries where the Augustinian order is present.

 

Click on these photos of Robert Prevost to enlarge - Villanova graduate, newly ordained.

In 2014, Francis sent him back into the mission field, naming him bishop of Chiclayo, in northern Peru, where he served until the Pope called him to Rome again for full-time service in the Roman Curia 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. In Rome, Prevost enjoys a reputation for industriousness, spending as much time working to identify new bishops as he does in dealing with problem cases. He is a polyglot who speaks English, Spanish, Italian, French and Portuguese and can read Latin and German, giving him abilities to communicate with his fellow cardinals in ways that others cannot. When he speaks, he does so with caution and great deliberation. A private man with a reserved style, he will not score high on the charm offensive. But his steely determination and clarity might comfort those looking for a leader who knows where he wants to go and how to get there.  He's also a Peruvian citizen and lived for years in Peru, first as a missionary and then as an archbishop. Pope Leo in October 2024 said that a "bishop is not supposed to be a little prince sitting in his kingdom, but rather called authentically to be humble, to be close to the people he serves, to walk with them and to suffer with them."

    

The name he chose is also very significant. Pope Leo the Great brought great unity in the church in the 5th century when the church was theologically very divided, even going as far as confronting Attila when he tried to invade Rome. On the other hand Pope Leo XIII who reigned between 1878 and 1903 was eminent in his social work, had a missionary spirit and wrote the classic social encyclical Rerum Novarum. Leo XIV is ready to build bridges as he said in his initial speech, emphasizing St Augustine’s writings and teachings. Ad Multos Annos Papa Leo