Analysis: Pope Leo XIV, The Discreet American

At the time it was announced from the Lodge of the Basilica of San Pedro that the College of Cardinals had chosen its brother -born in Chicago, Robert Prevost, as Pope, shared the generalized emotion of my colleagues journalists, Catholics and not Catholics, especially the Americans.

The result was even more news than if the cardinals had chosen an African or Asian, however exciting those outcomes would have been. From a purely journalistic point of view, the choice of a Pope born in the United States – something that conventional wisdom said it was impossible until we knew that it had happened – the discovery of a gold mine appeared.

For the first time, the Americans would listen to the leader of the Catholic Church to speak English as a mother tongue, and each of their statements would be analyzed, rightly or without it, as a comment on the actions of President Donald Trump, he himself a job generator for reporters. The two men would appear almost constantly on a divided screen, already figured literally. Rome would become a media capital along with Washington and New York.

Or we think many of us.

Today, almost three months after the choice of Pope Leo XIV, media reality challenges those expectations. Apart from Catholic media such as the National Catholic Register, who have naturally covered it with the intensity and enthusiasm demanded by his mission and audience, León has appeared in the news as rarely as a new Pope can do.

How this has happened is easier to explain than why, but you can speculate on both aspects.

In retrospect, we should have understood that practically no successor of Pope Francis would match the Argentine pontiff as what the reporters call good material. With his rebel style, his taste for surprise and his love for ambiguity, Francisco constantly generated controversy and interest, from his choice of a little traditional name at the beginning of his pontificate to a spontaneous appearance without clerical attire in San Pedro shortly before his end. His tendency to improvise in official events and his informal way of speaking in press conferences produced abundant citable phrases, of which “who am I to judge?” It was only the most famous.

León, in contrast, has carefully followed the tradition and papal protocol. His language is reflective and measured, but not distinctive in style. His attitude is modest, even self -criticism, perhaps a legacy of his origins in the west. His only interview with La Prensa from his choice, with Italian television last month, lasted less than three minutes and did not contribute any news. He exerts the position with manifest security – “it is as if it had been Pope for a hundred years,” a Vatican official recently told me – but instead of dominating the position, he has subsumed in him.

Pope Benedict XVI tried something similar after his own charismatic and outgoing predecessor. But Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had already passed two decades as a polarizing international figure, both inside and outside the church. Cardinal Prevost was not widely known before his choice.

The current Pope has also minimized the American identity that ensures his place in history books. When he went to the lodge to go to the world for the first time, Pope León changed from Italian to Spanish to send special greeting to his former Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, but did not speak in English or mention his hometown of Chicago. Has used English in moderation since then, perhaps because talking about lingua franca World Cup would magnify not only the scope but also the scrutiny of their words, especially on divisive issues.

León’s responses to events such as American bombing to Iran and the Israeli attack that caused three deaths in a Catholic Church in Gaza have been remarkably contained compared to what we expected from Francisco, who provocatively compared Israel’s campaign in the Palestinian enclave with terrorism and suggested that he could qualify as a genocide. The Pope has honored migrants and refugees as “messengers of hope”, but has not issued anything so forceful or as long range as Francisco’s open letter to US bishops last February, denouncing the deportation policies of the Trump administration.

Many of those who earned our lives by observing the Vatican were sure that the new Pope was whoever, would cause a fierce controversy if any of the deviations of tradition that helped define Francisco’s pontificate before public opinion. But León’s decisions in that regard – since using the MOzzetta In their first appearance until vacation in the papal town of Castel Gandolfo – they have not raised significant criticisms, nor warnings of rampant restorationism, by the progressive fans of their predecessor.

Most Catholics, of course, are satisfied with letting the Pope lead as he wants. Vocal minorities of both left and right still hope to claim it and, for now, they conform to assume that it aligns with their views, which gives them little reason to complain.

During the period prior to the last conclave, there was much spoken, between cardinals and common Catholics, about polarization in the church that had grown under Francis, and the debates about who to blame for that polarization only increased discord. León has pointed out that the unity of the Church, a value that mentioned half a dozen times in the homily of his inaugural mass, will be a priority of his pontificate. For now, your profile remarkably under help to maintain peace.

“He plays his cards near the chest,” an acquaintance of León told me shortly after his choice, and others who have worked closely with him coincide. But sooner or later, it will reveal them, either by clear statements about controversies in the Church or for what you choose not to say. Then the Pope will be in the news again, he likes it or not.

Translated and adapted by the ACI Press team. Originally published in the National Catholic Register.