Bay Area reacts to first American pope: ‘We are being given a seat at the big boy table'
Chicago native Robert Prevost, now christened Leo XIV, is the 267th pope, elected by the church's cardinals to lead the 1.4 billion Catholics worldwide, while holding significant cultural and political sway among the most powerful leaders.
Leo XIV, who spent much of his career in Peru and has dual citizenship there, replaced Pope Francis, who broadened the church's views on LGBTQ issues, while also advocating for action on climate change, immigration and human rights.
In Oakland, Keith Bachman, an Oakland native visiting his parents from Portland, decided to visit the Oakland Cathedral with his sister during their morning walk near Lake Merritt after hearing the news of a new pope.
'We hope that the movement for social justice that Francis started continues,' he said, adding he didn't know much about Prevost. 'We certainly need more people holding up fairness and justice.'
The choice of an American pope, albeit one with a long missionary sojourn in Peru, was unexpected. The United States is predominantly Protestant, as opposed to the Catholic-majority countries that have produced more popes.
Former President Barack Obama offered his sentiments via social media shortly after the announcement.
'Michelle and I send our congratulations to a fellow Chicagoan, His Holiness Pope Leo XIV,' he said. 'This is a historic day for the United States, and we will pray for him as he begins the sacred work of leading the Catholic Church and setting an example for so many, regardless of faith.'
In San Francisco, Father Michael Liliedahl, who is in residence at St. Stephens and director of campus ministry at San Francisco State, said he was indeed surprised by the choice.
'I never expected to have an American pope in my lifetime," he said, adding the fact that the new pope was born and raised in Chicago and educated at Villanova sends the message that the US counts, 'We are being given a seat at the big boy table. The church has always been a very European centered organization.'
But Liliedahl also pointed out that Pope Leo the 14th had done most of his ministry in Peru.
"You can tell his time in Peru and the small villages he worked in had a profound impact on him,' he said. 'At the very very beginning he talked about peace, bringing peace to the family, bringing peace to the world."
Liliedahl noted the new pope's choice of the name Leo.
'Both Leo I and Leo XIII talked about the dignity of the human person,' he said. 'I think there is a great continuity from Francis who would stand up for the human person whether that person be a migrant, the refugee, the unborn, the death row inmate, the outcast, the poor."
Leo XIV has not been afraid to stand up against those sitting in the highest seats of power.
In February, he twice repudiated the views of Vice President Vance, a Catholic, who had argued that prioritizing one's own country is a just and natural 'ordo amoris,' or order of love.
'[Y]ou love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then after that you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world,' Vance said.
'JD Vance is wrong,' Prevost wrote in a Feb. 3 tweet. 'Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love.'
Prevost then followed it up with another post on Feb.12, citing a letter from Pope Francis that also challenged Vance: 'Christian love,' the former pope wrote, 'is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups.'
'For many of us, the name Leo XIV happily brings to mind Leo XIII's Rerum novarum which was a blessing for working people,' she said. 'And it is heartening that His Holiness continued the blessing that Pope Francis gave on Easter Sunday: 'God loves everyone. Evil will not prevail.'
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