Who is Robert Francis Prevost, now known as Pope Leo XIV?

CHICAGO (WGN) — Robert Francis Prevost, born in Chicago and raised in South Holland, has been selected to lead the Catholic Church as the 267th pope.

He will be known as Pope Leo XIV and becomes the first pope from the United States in the 2,000-year history of the Catholic Church.

More on the new pope:

Robert Francis Prevost

Date of Birth: Sept. 14, 1955

Nationality: American and Peruvian

Previous position: Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops; president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America under Francis

Experience: Archbishop of Chiclayo, Peru; head of the Augustinian religious order

Made a cardinal by: Francis

Background

Francis brought Prevost, 69, 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 held a prominence going into the conclave that few other cardinals had.

He was known to virtually every cardinal due to his role in Vatican administration, emerging as a potential compromise candidate that could appeal to both those who favored Pope Francis’ reforms and others who desired a return to more traditional practices.

There has 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, is also a Peruvian citizen and lived for years in Peru, first as a missionary and then as an archbishop.

Prevost was also twice elected prior general, or top leader, of the Augustinian religious order, the 13th century order founded by St. Augustine. Francis clearly had an eye on him for years, moving him from the Augustinian leadership back to Peru in 2014 to serve as the administrator and later archbishop of Chiclayo.

He remained in that position, acquiring Peruvian citizenship in 2015, until Francis brought him to Rome in 2023 to assume the presidency of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. In that job, he kept in regular contact with the Catholic hierarchy in the part of the world that still counts the most Catholics.

Ever since he arrived in Rome, Prevost has kept a low public profile, but he was well known to the men who count.

Significantly, he presided over one of the most revolutionary reforms Francis made, when he added three women to the voting bloc that decides which bishop nominations to forward to the pope. In early 2025, Francis again showed his esteem by appointing Prevost to the most senior rank of cardinals, suggesting he would at least be Francis’ choice in any future conclave.

The Rev. Fidel Purisaca Vigil, the communications director for Prevost’s old diocese in Chiclayo, remembers the cardinal rising each day and having breakfast with his fellow priests after saying his prayers.

“No matter how many problems he has, he maintains good humor and joy,” Purisaca said in an email.

— By Franklin Briceño in Lima, Peru, and Nicole Winfield in Vatican City