Get to Know our New Pope: Leo XIV

by Margaux Salcedo | May 9, 2025

We join the world in rejoicing in thanksgiving to the Father for Pope Leo XIV, who we are confident will continue the legacy of our much loved Pope Francis.

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost becomes the 267th pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church on the Feast of the Apparition of St Michael the Archangel, May 8, 2025, taking on the name Pope Leo XIV. Photo: Vatican Media.

As we pray for our 267th pontiff, let's get to know our new pope, Robert Francis Prevost .

He is the youngest of three brothers.

His brothers are Louis Martin Prevost and John Joseph Prevost.

They grew up in Dolton, Illinois, in the United States. In an interview, his brother John recalls that Pope Leo XIV whom they called Rob knew he wanted to be a priest from an early age, even playing priest as a child, creating a make-shift altar using an ironing board.

Cardinal Robert Prevost with his brothers Louis Prevost (left) John Prevost (right). Photo: John Prevost.

Today, while living in different continents, they remain close and would speak virtually every day, playing word games like Wordle.

Their parents are Louis Marius Prevost, of French and Italian descent, and Mildred Martínez, of Spanish descent.

He went to Minor Seminary.

He first studied to become a priest at the Minor Seminary of the Augustinian Fathers.

His journey as a priest include the following milestones:

• September 1, 1977 , he entered the novitiate of the Order of Saint Augustine (O.S.A.) in Saint Louis, in the Province of Our Lady of Good Counsel of Chicago.

• September 2, 1978, he made his first profession.

• August 29, 1981, he made his solemn vows.

• June 19, 1982. He was ordained a priest at the Augustinian College of Saint Monica in Rome by Archbishop Jean Jadot, then pro-president of the Secretariat for Non-Christians, which later became the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and then the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue.

He is a mathematician.

He actually has a degree in Mathematics from Villanova University in Pennsylvania, where he graduated in 1977. He also studied Philosophy at this University. 

Villanova yearbook photo of Robert Prevost (Pope Leo XIV). Photo: Chicago History Facebook.

He is a Canon lawyer

While he received his theological education at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, he was later sent by his superiors to Rome to study Canon Law at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum). 

He was a missionary.

After obtaining his licentiate in 1984, while preparing his doctoral thesis, he was sent to the Augustinian mission in Chulucanas, Piura, Peru, from 1985 to 1986.

The following year, after defending his doctoral thesis on "The Role of the Local Prior in the Order of Saint Augustine", he was appointed vocation director and missions director of the Augustinian Province of “Mother of Good Counsel” in Olympia Fields, Illinois (USA).

The following year, he joined the mission in Trujillo, also in Peru, as director of the joint formation project for Augustinian candidates from the vicariates of Chulucanas, Iquitos, and Apurímac. 

Fr. Robert Prevost in Peru. Photo: Vatican Media.

He is the first Augustinian to become Pope

His biography at the Vatican website narrates his assignments as an Augustinian priest:

"Over the course of eleven years, he served as prior of the community (1988–1992), formation director (1988–1998), and instructor for professed members (1992–1998), and in the Archdiocese of Trujillo as judicial vicar (1989–1998) and professor of Canon Law, Patristics, and Moral Theology at the Major Seminary “San Carlos y San Marcelo.” At the same time, he was also entrusted with the pastoral care of Our Lady Mother of the Church, later established as the parish of Saint Rita (1988–1999), in a poor suburb of the city, and was parish administrator of Our Lady of Monserrat from 1992 to 1999."

He then became head of the Augustinians for two consecutive terms.

"In 1999, he was elected Provincial Prior of the Augustinian Province of “Mother of Good Counsel” in Chicago, and two and a half years later, the ordinary General Chapter of the Order of Saint Augustine, elected him as Prior General, confirming him in 2007 for a second term.

"In October 2013, he returned to his Augustinian Province in Chicago, serving as director of formation at the Saint Augustine Convent, first councilor, and provincial vicar.

"His episcopal motto is “In Illo uno unum”—words pronounced by Saint Augustine in a sermon on Psalm 127 to explain that “although we Christians are many, in the one Christ we are one.”

He is second pope from the Americas, the first born in the USA.

He was born in the United States but his nationality is now Peruvian.

Hence, he is the second Roman Pontiff - after Pope Francis - from the Americas.

He was born on September 14, 1955, in Chicago, Illinois. However, he was called to Peru when, on November 3, 2014, Pope Francis appointed him to become Apostolic Administrator of the Peruvian Diocese of Chiclayo, elevating him to the episcopal dignity as Titular Bishop of Sufar. He entered the Diocese on November 7, in the presence of Apostolic Nuncio James Patrick Green, who ordained him Bishop just over a month later, on December 12, the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, in the Cathedral of Saint Mary.

He was a Bishop of Peru

He was appointed Bishop of Chiclayo, in northwest Peru, by Pope Francis on September 26, 2015.

In March 2018, he was elected second vice-president of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference, where he also served as a member of the Economic Council and president of the Commission for Culture and Education.

On April 15, 2020, he was also appointed Apostolic Administrator of the Peruvian Diocese of Callao.

He served as Bishop of Chiclayo from 2015 to 2023.

He was Prefect of the Dicastery of Bishops

In 2019, Pope Francis appointed him a member of the Congregation for the Clergy (July 13, 2019), and in 2020, a member of the Congregation for Bishops (November 21).

Pope Francis appoints Fr. Robert Prevost as Bishop of Chiclayo in Peru. Photo: Vatican Media.

On January 30, 2023, the Pope called him to Rome as Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, promoting him to the rank of Archbishop. 

Pope Francis created him Cardinal in the Consistory of September 30 that year and  assigned him the Diaconate of Saint Monica. He officially took possession of it on January 28, 2024. 

As head of the Dicastery, he participated in the Pope’s most recent Apostolic Journeys and in both the first and second sessions of the 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops on synodality, held in Rome from October 4 to 29, 2023, and from October 2 to 27, 2024, respectively.

Meanwhile, on October 4, 2023, Pope Francis appointed him as a member of the Dicasteries for Evangelization (Section for First Evangelization and New Particular Churches), for the Doctrine of the Faith, for the Eastern Churches, for the Clergy, for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, for Culture and Education, for Legislative Texts, and of the Pontifical Commission for the Vatican City State.

Finally, on February 6 of this year, the Argentine Pope promoted him to the Order of Bishops, making him a Cardinal-Bishop, granting him the title of the Suburbicarian Church of Albano.

Three days later, on February 9, he celebrated the Mass presided over by Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square for the Jubilee of the Armed Forces, the second major event of the Holy Year of Hope.

During the most recent hospitalization of his predecessor at the “Gemelli” hospital, Prevost presided over the Rosary for Pope Francis’s health in Saint Peter’s Square on March 3.

He has been to the Philippines NINE times!

Pope Leo XIV, then simply called Father Robert Prevost, has visited the Philippines 9 times.

The most documented visits were his trips to Cebu in 2004 and Manila in 2008 and 2013.

He visited Talisay City, Cebu to bless a friary of the Order of Saint Augustine of the Santo Niño de Cebu Parish on Jan. 31, 2004. At the time, he was Prior General of the Order of Saint Augustine.

In November 10, 2008, he presided over Holy Mass at the Professorium House Chapel, followed by a fraternal meal at the refectory with Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales. He was welcomed by then Archbishop of Manila Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales and there is even have a photo of the future pope enjoying a San Miguel Pale Pilsen with Lolo Dency.

Fr. Robert Prevost, Prior General of the Order of St Augustine, enjoying a local beer with Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales. Photo: Seminario San Agustin

Located inside the San Agustin Monastery Complex in Intramuros, Manila, Seminario San Agustin serves as the province’s formation house, where young men are trained in the Augustinian way of life to become priests or friars. He also had the opportunity to visit the Colegio San Agustin in Binan City, Laguna, and the University of Regina Carmeli in Malolos City, Bulacan.

He came back on April 23, 2013, still as Prior General, for the blessing and opening of the Augustinians' formation house, joined by then Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle, and witnessed by several friars of the Vicariate of Orient in the Philippines and China, the Prior Provincial of the Old Spanish Province of the Philippines, and the Prior Provincial of the Province of Santo Nino of Cebu and numerous guests.

Let us pray that he will be able to visit the Philippines again, this time as Pope Leo XIV!!!