Chicago’s Haitian community celebrates Pope Leo XIV’s heritage

CHICAGO — Aline Lauture with the Haitian Congress Center was thrilled to learn Pope Leo XIV not only has ties to Chicago but to her ethnic background.

“This news, we just embrace the news,” Lauture said. “The pope has Haitian roots, we’re like, ‘Yay!’”

The City of Chicago was founded by a Haitian; Jean Baptiste Point du Sable.

“Now, the fact we share a cultural link, if not a kinship, with the pope is very important,” Jari Honora said.

Honora, a New Orleans based genealogist, did some digging and found it was Pope Leo’s maternal grandparents who are described as black of “mulatto” in several census documents.

“Their names were Joseph Martinez and Louise Baquie,” Honora said.

Honora found on their 1887 marriage license, Martinez listed his birthplace as Haiti.

It was common for people of mixed French and Black Caribbean roots to settle in New Orleans, then many moved to Chicago during the Great Migration, including the pope’s grandparents in 1911.

Census documents in Chicago show his grandparents identified as white. Genealogists theorize they may have shifted their racial identity to assimilate.

“The fact they migrated from New Orleans to Chicago, and I migrated from Haiti to Chicago, it’s a beautiful story,” Lauture said.

It was in the Windy City where the couple had Pope Leo’s mother, Mildred Martinez. The family kept close to the Catholic Church.

“There was always an openness to accepting a call to religious vocation as a child. In and out of his home were a lot of their neighborhood priests because they liked his mom’s cooking,” Honora said. “Once I discovered they had ties to New Orleans, I said, ‘No wonder they liked her cooking.’”

Adding a rich cultural layer to the papacy, showcasing the melting pot of ethnic backgrounds in the United States.

“Haitians take pride in their religion. A lot of Haitians are Catholics,” Lauture said. “I think he’ll be a great pope for the world, for people who want someone to speak to them about being kind, being a good person, a good Catholic.”