Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, now Pope Leo XIV, enters the papacy as the latest in a line of leaders named Leo—some of the Church’s most historically significant popes. His chosen name may reflect a desire to uphold both social justice and spiritual courage.
According to 24 Oras, the 69-year-old Augustinian priest was born in Chicago in 1955, ordained in 1982, and holds advanced degrees in Divinity and Canon Law from Rome’s Pontifical College of St. Thomas Aquinas. He became a naturalized Peruvian after over a decade of missionary service in Peru, where he also led an Augustinian seminary. By 1999, he rose to become Prior General of the Order of St. Augustine.
His papal name, Leo XIV, seems to connect him to Pope Leo XIII, known for his groundbreaking 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum, which laid the foundation for Catholic social teaching and advocated workers’ rights. Jesuit priest Albert Alejo noted that Leo XIII was a pivotal figure in Church reform on labor and justice.
The new pope may also be inspired by Pope Leo I, or Leo the Great, who famously confronted Attila the Hun to protect Rome and the Vatican. Fr. Joseph Zaldivar, a seminary professor, said Leo the Great embodied fatherly protection—something he imagines Pope Leo XIV will emulate in defending victims of injustice, terrorism, and war.
Observers see Pope Leo XIV’s name choice as symbolic of a leader intent on both defending the vulnerable and continuing the Church’s mission of justice and peace in the modern world.