Leo XIV, when I was a bishop in 2023: Not all meetings with Cardinal Bergoglio always agreed

On March 14, 2023, the Bishops of Peru delivered the Gold Medal of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo to Mons. Robert Prevost in recognition of his departure to Rome to assume the position of Prefect of the Dicastery for the Bishops. During the ceremony, Prevost – current Pope Leo XIV – recalled a detail of his relationship with then Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio when he was a prior general of the Augustinians.

“I am not going to tell you the reason, but let’s say that not all the meetings with Cardinal Bergoglio always agreed, say, between the two, by mutual agreement,” said Mons. Prevost with a smile, without specifying what the disagreements they had with Pope Francis.

“I’m never going to be a bishop”

In those words of thanks in 2023, published this Saturday on the channel of Youtube Of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference, the now Pope recalled that one day before the pontificate of Pope Francis had been completed and that “he knew Jorge Mario Bergoglio, archbishop of Buenos Aires at the time. As I was general of the Augustinians, I had found him several times and, when he was chosen (Pope), I said to some brothers of mine: ‘Well, that is very good and thank God I will never be bishop.

Surely, at that time, Prevost did not imagine that just over two years after that speech would become a bishop of Rome and the successor of Francisco in the Chair of San Pedro.

In the video of this 2023 speech he also reported that Francisco presided over the opening mass of the General Chapter of the Augustinians in the Church of San Agustín in Rome on August 28, 2013.

At the end of that Eucharist, Prevost recalled, Francisco said: “Now rest.” And he replied: “Thank you, Holy Father, I hope to rest.” “He left me a few months and then appointed me Bishop of Chiclayo. I don’t know when the break comes, but here we are,” he said with a laugh.

The “Chullo” of Peru who gave him at 5 years

In that intervention of 2023, Mons. Prevost also shared an anecdote about his first link with Peru: “When I was 5 years old, I don’t know if I knew where Peru was or not, but I had an uncle who worked here and gave me, the aunt actually, a chullo (traditional wool hat of the Peruvian Andes) of those that in the land of Apurimac they take there Peruvian began from a very tender age. ”

The now Pope Leo XIV stressed that his stay in Peru will be “one of the greatest gifts than the Lord” has given him, as well as “a great treasure.”

Obedience in “all ages of life”

In reference to the position he was going to assume in the Vatican, the then bishop said: “I am not at all happy, my preference would have been to continue in Chiclayo, but one has to obey all ages of life.”

At the end of his speech, he asked for prayers and stressed: “For the Lord of Miracles, Peru will always be present in my heart, in my prayers.”

The Lord of Miracles, also called Christ of Pachacamilla, Christ Purple or Christ Moreno, is an image of Christ painted on an adobe wall in the seventeenth century and which is preserved in the Church of the Nazarenes in the historic center of Lima.