By Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost was chosen as the Roman Catholic Church’s 267th pope on May 8, 2025, and will be known as Pope Leo XIV. A former missionary, seminary lecturer, bishop in Peru, and, more recently, the Vatican’s prefect for bishops.
His selection as Supreme Pontiff of the Catholic Church was a landmark decision in many ways. He is the first American-born pope and the first member of the Augustinian order to be elected pope in almost five centuries. Beyond the historical headlines, his early gestures and choice of pontifical name provide insight into the type of leader Pope Leo XIV would be.
Moreover, the day of Pope Leo’s election, May 8th is a day of remembrance for the Victory over the Fascism in Europe, or the triumph over evil, and the hope of peace.
On the other hand, the new pontiff is going to be reigning over 1.4 billion Catholics worldwide. It therefore seems likely that major powers would want to influence a papal conclave; who, with his international influence, would be able to support their ideologies and legitimise policies.
In this regard, the example of the US is telling: although U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance is openly Catholic, Washington and the Vatican have often clashed throughout the first and the ongoing second Donald Trump’s presidency.
Even Russian President Vladimir Putin made his interest clear in a statement issued on the death of the Pope about maintaining the alliance that had begun to develop between Moscow and the Vatican in recent decades.
Pope Leo XIV greeted the city of Rome and the world at his first appearance as the Successor of Peter from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica:
Pope Leo XIV greeted the city of Rome and the world at his first appearance as the Successor of Peter from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica.
“Peace be with you! Dearest brothers and sisters, this was the first greeting of the risen Christ, the good shepherd, who gave… pic.twitter.com/AqJcOpK5Ge
— Vatican News (@VaticanNews) May 8, 2025
What You Need to Know About Catholicism in the USA
Among Christian communities in the USA, only non-denominational groups are growing in membership, while traditional Protestants and Catholics are declining.
However, Catholics are one of the largest religious groups in the United States, outnumbering any single Protestant denomination. The U.S. has more Catholics than all but three other countries – Brazil, Mexico, and the Philippines – according to the Vatican’s 2021 Statistical Yearbook of the Church.
Around 20 percent of U.S. adults (roughly 53 million) describe themselves as Catholics. This percentage is slightly lower than in 2007, when 24% of U.S. adults identified as Catholic, but it has remained stable for 10 years now.
In addition, there is a growing movement among young men in America (and in Europe) that is pushing for a return to traditional Catholicism, reflecting a broader cultural shift towards conservative values and a desire for a more orthodox church.
Trump’s response to the Pope’s criticism included highlighting the small percentage of Catholics in America, questioning the Pope’s authority as a non-American, and pointing out the Vatican’s restrictive nature, which resonated with many working-class Catholics.
“Catholics reflect the diversity of America,” said Ryan Burge, an expert and associate professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University.
In the 2024 presidential election, approximately half of white Catholics (51 percent) expressed positive views of Trump, as did 47 percent of white non-evangelical Protestants and 45 percent of Hispanic Protestants.
In contrast, the Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris, had a higher approval rate among Hispanic Catholics (65 percent). Harris had an advantage over Trump in the battleground states, with nearly seven out of 10 Hispanics and more than three-quarters of Black Catholics favoring the sitting vice president, according to a poll conducted by the National Catholic Reporter.
Pope Francis’ Heated Relationship with Trump And U.S. Bishops
Pope Francis enjoyed relatively high approval ratings among the majority of American Catholics, and yet, he has come under criticism from some American Church leaders. In November 2023, the Pope had to chastise two of his loudest detractors, Bishop Joseph E. Strickland and Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, both Americans.
The debate about modernisation of the Catholic Church reflects the late Pope Francis’s progressive Catholicism conflicting with a rising conservative movement. The deep tensions within the Church called for a more conservative pope following Francis’s death.
Just days before Francis was hospitalized in February, he blasted the Trump administration’s deportation plans, warning that they would deprive migrants of their inherent dignity.
In a letter to U.S. bishops, Francis also appeared to respond to Vance directly for having claimed that Catholic doctrine justified such policies. The two collided again when Vice President JD Vance visited His Holiness in Rome just a day before Pope Francis passed.
As Pope Francis in his February 2025 letter to the American Bishops wrote, “[The] authentic rule of law lies precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalized. The true common good is promoted when the society (…) – as I have affirmed on numerous occasions – welcomes, protects, supports, and integrates the weakest, the most fragile, unprotected, and vulnerable.”
This does not impede the development of a policy that regulates orderly and legal migration. However, this progress cannot come about through the privilege of some and the sacrifice of others. What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.”
There was a lot of disagreement between Francis and the first Trump administration, too. Here are just a few instances: One of Pope Francis’ main messages, which was also quoted at his funeral, was “Build bridges, not walls”—a call he repeated many times. This collided with Trump’s advocacy for constructing a border wall on the Mexican border in his first term.
A prominent Trumpist Vatican expert, Edward Pentin, also criticised the Pope for his views on immigration, which he said were out of line with ordinary Christians. There is evidence that the attacks on the Pope on social media were mainly stemming from (fake) pro-Trump Twitter accounts.
Most recently, the re-elected Trump-nominated Vatican ambassador Brian Burch, as head of an organisation called CatholicVote, accused the Pope of causing enormous confusion in the Church. In response, Francis had appointed Robert McElroy, a major Trump critic, as Archbishop of Washington.
Not surprisingly, Trump and his circle are therefore seeking to promote their opinions around the Vatican, for a pope who represents their colours to be elected.
“I’d like to be Pope. That would be my number one choice,” Trump joked to reporters a few weeks ago. However, the US President did plug a dark-horse candidate who would make history as the first American Pope. While he said he has no preference for who should replace the late Francis, he indicated that his secret favourite was Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the archbishop of New York.
Leo XIV as the First American on St. Peter’s Throne
Yesterday, in the Vatican square, tens of thousands eagerly awaited the rise of the “white smoke”. All Catholics’ wishes came true in the early evening. When it was revealed that Cardinal Robert Prevost from Chicago was elected, many American flags appeared in the crowd. His selection broke the widely held assumption that an American cannot be pope.
Experts suggest the new American pope is expected to unify the continent rather than represent North American politics. His election suggests continuity with Pope Francis, as initial tensions in the Vatican may ease during celebrations, with a focus on faith and a likely inaugural mass in St. Peter’s Square.
However, Prevost, born and raised in the US, spent most of his life outside the US, working extensively in Italy and Peru, and became a naturalised citizen of Peru after spending over 20 years there as a missionary.
This leads to the conclusion that the new pope wants a missionary church that builds bridges and serves the poor, emphasising the importance of welcoming all rather than being a “prince sitting in his kingdom”.
According to the American Catholic news site, NCR, Prevost has voted in Republican primaries in the state of Illinois, yet he is a social justice advocate and generally opposed to many of President Donald Trump’s policies, based on his social media posts.
After his missions in the Americas, Pope Francis named him a prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops in the Roman Curia, meaning he advised Francis on bishop appointments around the world.
In this role in the Vatican, Prevost amassed a reputation for industriousness, spending as much time working to identify new bishops as he did in dealing with problem cases, such as the above-mentioned clash between Francis I and the US bishops.
“I Think the Pope Should Avoid Globalist-Liberal Ideas About World Leadership”
(There is no reference to Leo XIV in this interview, which was conducted before the election of the new Pope – the Editor.)
We inquired from Gergely Szilvay about the late Francis’ papacy and the potential candidates who might succeed him on the throne of Saint Peter. Gergely Szilvay is a journalist at the Hungarian conservative Mandiner and the author of six books. He studied history and media at Pázmány Péter Catholic University of Budapest, where he acquired his PhD on political theory.
In a book about Pope Francis, one of his advisors, Antonio Spadaro expressed that they see the world as a single city with a single politics and aims to create a “universal political authority” (publica auctoritas universalis) based on a paradigm of international relations that ultimately enforces a transcendent order. This geopolitical-philosophical consideration was opposed by populist sovereignists and Christian nationalists who could not rise above their own cultural, ‘tribal’ frames. What do you make of it?
Antonio Sparado has not been pope and does not possess infallibility, as the pope also possesses infallibility only in certain cases. No Catholic has to accept Sparado’s political visions. Of course, all people are brothers in Christ, and there is a mystic ‘egality in Christ’, but we do not have to accept globalist views of politics just because a Jesuit says it.
Anyway, it wouldn’t be a “transcendent order”, only a temporary one. Also, I think that the unity of humanity in Christ does not straightforwardly mean that there should be a universal political authority. Plenty of Catholic thinkers would oppose it, such as Joseph de Maistre. Sparado is a leftist-idealist Jesuit; I’m a right-wing realist Catholic. It is unfair to equate contemporary populist patriotism with tribal frames; nations are not tribes.
And there is the ancient Christian idea of the order of love, represented by St. Augustine and Aquinas, which says that because we are embodied, limited beings, our practice of love starts with our closest relatives; after that come bigger communities, our nation, our civilisation, and only after that humanity. So it is a matter of balance, not exclusive ideas.
Gergely Szilvay
If you take the former conclaves, it would be difficult to think of a papal election in which geopolitical realities have not played an important role. For instance, the election of John XXIII: he was the one who then convened the Second Vatican Council. During that time, there was a need to adapt to the challenges that came either from the Communist East or the more and more secular West. Another example: John Paul II. Electing a Polish Pope was a clear message from the Catholic Church against communism.
Both John XXIII and John Paul II were not papabiles, and their election was rather a compromise, and they didn’t follow certain “geopolitical realities”. Both popes’ elections were a coincidence. John XXIII was elected for a short, transitional pontificate. Him calling the Second Vatican Council was quite a surprise. John Paul II was also a surprise. His election, if anything, was contrary to geopolitical realities.
Some argue that there were several nations’ interests in the process as well. At the Second Vatican Council, the American Jesuit John Courtney Murray successfully argued that the church could and should support religious freedom in secular states.
It was his sole influence, and anyway, he wasn’t satisfied with the council. But his influence wasn’t America’s influence.
What do you think of the relationship between the late Pope and the current American President? In 2017, Pope Francis suggested that Trump may not be considered a Christian due to his anti-immigration policy. In response, a Trumpist Vatican expert, Edward Pentin, said the Pope’s views “are out of line with ordinary Christians”.
I side with Trump and Cardinal Robert Sarah on the issue of immigration. Sarah is an African who also opposes broad immigration and stresses a nation’s right to regulate it. As a Catholic, I am not obliged to follow Francis’s immigration suggestions.
Pope Francis also received criticism from some American Catholic leaders. Two of his loudest detractors are Bishop Joseph E. Strickland and Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke. Interestingly, the latter is among those who have a chance to become Pope.
I do not think that Burke is papabile, although I would like him as pope. If you look at Burke’s clash with Francis, it was mainly about doctrinal clarity.
Back in February, Francis blasted Trump’s deportation plans, warning that they would deprive migrants of their inherent dignity. In a letter to U.S. bishops, Francis also appeared to respond to Vance directly for having claimed that Catholic doctrine justified such policies. Now that the Pope has passed, can the Trump administration intercede to get a Pope they like next?
I do not think that Trump was successfully stopped by the Pope’s letter or by the rather pro-immigration stance of the U.S. bishops’ conference. If dignity is inherent, you can’t deprive it by deportation or anything else. If you can deprive it, it is not inherent. Of course, every politician, every leader wants a pope who does not clash with them. But, in my opinion, Trump’s influence on the conclave is zero. To think otherwise is ridiculous.
Several competent sources see Hungarian bishop Peter Erdő as a contender for the papal throne. What are the arguments for and against him?
If cardinals think that they need a pope who is a distinguished canon lawyer with an international reputation, who is good in diplomacy, and who is a good organiser, and also can be a man of compromise, then Péter Erdő can be a good choice. Also, Central European church leaders still remember the oppression by communism, which unites them today with the world peripheries. So Erdő’s region is also on the West and on the periphery.
If cardinals think they need somebody totally different, then Erdő is not papabile.
Who are your top favourite candidates for the Throne of St. Peter? What are their foreign relations/diplomatic priorities?
My favourite is Malcolm Ranjith, archbishop of Colombo, leader of the church of Sri Lanka. He worked in the Vatican under Benedict XVI, and he was nuncio for Far East countries, so he has different experiences. He is in the line of Burke and Sarah. But I also would like to see Pierbattista Pizzaballa, Willem Eijk, Anders Arborelius, or Péter Erdő as Pope, of course. The Vatican is not an ordinary country to have something as ordinary as foreign relations or interests. I think the pope should avoid globalist-liberal ideas about world leadership, but anyway, priorities will be set up by the new pope. But I stress that I do not think that foreign policy is first at the conclave, and cardinals do not select somebody on that basis.
