08-05-2025
Chicago celebrates hometown pope with memes, Malört, deep dish jokes
Robert Prevost has been elected the first American pope in history, and Chicago is here for it.
The big picture: When word came of Pope Leo XIV's Chicago roots, witty local comments flooded social media timelines, even from our elected leaders.
"Everything dope, including the Pope, comes from Chicago," Mayor Brandon Johnson posted.
The vibe: Jokesters quickly pointed to Chicago's famous "dems and dos" speech pattern, calling the new pope "Da Pope" and sharing memes of the "Superfans" sketch from "Saturday Night Live."
Zoom in: Chicago, a historically Catholic city, didn't stop with references to Coach Ditka, George Wendt and Chris Farley. Here are some of the best early reactions:
"Deep dish eucharist," Eion Higgins posted on Bluesky.
"Finally Rome will have good pizza," Rory Cooper shared.
"Cannot wait for holy water & wine to be replaced by Malort & Old Style," Shane Riordan mused. Our Axios colleague Alex Fitzpatrick thought along similar lines: "When does he start turning water into malort?"
"Previously on Chicago Pope…" comedian Sandy Marshall joked, in reference to Dick Wolf's Chicago procedural television dramas.
"Chicago Pope about to walk out to this," Kara Fagan posted with the intro video and song for the Chicago Bulls.
"The new pope is a @Cubs fan which means he ironically hates the Cardinals," broadcaster Caitlin Hendrix posted.
"The new Pope says he's from Chicago but he's *actually* from Naperville," broadcaster Mike Golic Jr. joked.
"Would be great if he can do something about the construction on the Kennedy," Ben Wittenstein joked.
"Pope Leo XIV is the first pope to know exactly what Dave Matthews did on Aug. 8, 2004," Mike Beauvais posted, cleverly referencing when Matthews' bus dumped waste onto a boat full of tourists on the Chicago River.
"Payton, Jordan, Oprah, Ditka, Royko and now…God."
