Paul Kengor: The 'least American' but 'very American' pope

Prior to the papal conclave, I did a column titled “The pope of surprises.” It made the point that, throughout history, the Catholic cardinal-electors leave the Sistine Chapel selecting a pope few expected. But gosh, no one expected an American pope.

“One of the more extraordinary days of my life,” was the assessment of Bishop Robert Barron, who covered the conclave for EWTN Television. “I was one of the army of commentators who confidently asserted that no American would be elected pope … . The cardinals would never hand governance of the universal Church to a citizen of the USA.”

It was long believed by papal watchers that there would be no American pope in our lifetimes. There has long been a fear factor among non-American Catholics that, with America being the world’s political-military colossus, and its president the world’s temporal leader, the pope could not be an American. It would be too much for the world’s temporal and spiritual leaders to both be Americans.

Perhaps because of that, the very diplomatic Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost did not speak any English from the Loggia at St. Peter’s Square after being announced the next pope on May 8. He spoke Italian and some Spanish — both fitting given that he is now Bishop of Rome and had been a bishop in Peru. His choice not to speak English at that moment might have been a move to allay any international anxieties over an American pope.

But no fear, apparently. The word out of Rome right after the choice of Prevost is that he was considered “the least American American,” which was certainly true among the American cardinals, given his international experience in recent decades.

Because of that rich experience, with a foot in the old world and the new world, in Europe and in South and North America, Prevost was seen as a truly universal cardinal. The word “catholic” means “universal.”

Everyone expected the conclave to go through many ballots, given the lack of a consensus candidate. Prevost was sometimes listed among the dozen or two “papabile” (pope-able) cardinals, but usually way down the list. It was assumed that whoever got the requisite 89 votes would do so only after multiple ballots. Pope Francis had been chosen in five ballots; Pope John Paul II in eight. And yet, surprisingly, on the fourth ballot, Prevost was chosen, reportedly in a landslide, receiving over 100 votes. He was a pick of striking unity, praised by prelates as diverse as the liberal Father James Martin and conservative Cardinal Raymond Burke.

The world got a consensus pope and an American pope.

And yet it must be said that, as genuinely universal as he is, Leo XIV is also a very American American.

Born in Chicago in September 1955, Prevost is a prototypical product of the American melting pot. His mother, born Mildred Agnes Martinez, hailed from a mixed-race family of Hispanic and Black Creole origin in New Orleans. Her parents were variously described in U.S. Census documents as black, mulatto, and white. His father, Louis Marius Prevost, was of French and Italian descent.

This American pope is universal in his ethnicity.

In a sense, yes, Prevost was the least American of the American cardinals. But he’s still very American. And he’s now the biggest American in the history of the Roman Catholic Church.

Quite a surprise pope indeed.