Leo XIV, the first visible features

When a Pope is elected, everyone awaits the first governing decisions. It is generally said that the first hundred days are those that will define the entire pontificate, as is usually said of elected leaders. Leo XIV’s first hundred days, however, did not bring major governing decisions. Calm pervaded and characterized Leo’s first 100 days, starkly contrasting with the first days of the Francis pontificate. Leo’s reign, however, will not be one in competition with Pope Francis, not directly or explicitly.

That much is already evident. Some other characteristics, as well, are already visible.

The first characteristic is collegiality. Leo XIV is a friar, in the purest sense of the word. He was the prior general of his congregation, the Augustinians. And he also felt like a friar when he was a missionary bishop, and when he was a cardinal and prefect of the Dicastery of Bishops. It is said that he went to eat at the General Curia of the Augustinians whenever he could and that he had continuous and regular visits with his Augustinian brothers.

This collegiality will be brought into the exercise of the papacy. The news is that Leo XIV will not live alone in the Apostolic Palace, but will have what are called “flatmates.” This isn’t an absolute novelty. Benedict XVI also had his own “pontifical family,” made up of the Memores Domini, four consecrated lay women of Communion and Liberation who later lived with him in the Mater Ecclesiae monastery, after his renunciation.

John Paul II never had an empty house, either. He hosted breakfasts, lunches, and dinners, and always surrounded himself with people, asking for their opinions.

In short, you don’t enter the Apostolic Palace alone.

And it’s no coincidence that Pope Francis—a Jesuit, but one who spent most of his life living outside Jesuit community—decided not to live in the Apostolic Palace for “psychiatric reasons,” as he himself said. He simply didn’t have a “family,” he even changed his secretaries several times, and he would have ended up alone in the Apostolic Palace, with little contact with the outside world and no trusted friends to act as a sounding board (or filter). Pope Francis was his own sounding board, his own filter.

So, Pope Leo XIV will form a mini community of friars in the Apostolic Palace, a group of people he can trust and confide in. Some fear the Pope might be influenced in this way. The truth is, everyone is influenced by the people they trust. But building a community, a sense of stability, and constant dialogue is also a good way to maintain self-control. Community helps the Pope protect himself from impulsiveness in the moment. Collegiality helps him weigh his decisions. Leo XIV seems intent on choosing this path.

The second characteristic is that of focusing everything on the Gospel and the proclamation of the Word. Leo XIV knew the world of Latin America well, having been there first as a missionary and then as a bishop. But, at the same time, he also demonstrated an awareness of the perils of the Latin American world. Where Pope Francis opened experiments, Leo XIV defined them, seeking to avoid consequences not precisely in line with the Catholic faith.

Two examples illustrate this. The most recent is the telegram, signed by Cardinal Parolin on behalf of the Pope, sent to the meeting of the bishops of the Amazon, held in Bogotá from August 17 to 20. The telegram contains a detail that did not go unnoticed. The Pope calls for placing Jesus Christ at the center, because in this way injustices are reversed, and then defines as “no less evident” the right and duty to care for our common home, “so that no one irresponsibly destroys the natural goods that speak of the goodness and beauty of the Creator.”

But, the Pope adds – quoting, with a particular touch of class, Saint Ignatius of Loyola – that man must not submit to natural goods as a “slave or worshipper of nature, since these things are given to us to achieve our goal of praising God and thus obtaining the salvation of souls.”

At the beginning of the Special Synod for the Pan-Amazon Region, on October 4, 2019, Pope Francis attended an indigenous tree-planting ceremony in the Vatican Gardens. That ceremony went too far, so far that Pope Francis himself showed signs of discomfort and left as quickly as he could. That’s the risk when you start processes: you’re then unable to control them. From there, the Pachamama controversy arose, fueled by the fact that Pope Francis sincerely wanted to platform and stress the value of indigenous cultures.

Leo XIV opted for a different approach, which was to define the problems from the outset, but Leo’s was an act of discontinuity with Pope Francis’s methods, not with the themes.

Arguably, that makes it more significant than a direct or explicit repudiation of Franciscan themes.

The second indication is found in the Pope’s message for the 40th ordinary assembly of the Council of Latin American Episcopal Conferences, held from May 26 to 30. “In the current historical situation,” the Pope wrote, “in which a great number of men and women endure the tribulations and poverty caused by ongoing crises on a continental and global scale, we urgently need to remember that it is the Risen One, present among us, who protects and guides the Church, reviving her in hope.”

Leo XIV did not deny either Pope Francis’s social vision or his theology of the people. He did, however, emphasize the centrality of Jesus Christ, the central theme when discussing Liberation Theology or Catholic social movements in Latin America. The risk is always that social problems become preponderant, and God is then forgotten.

Leo XIV thus shows himself to be a Pope of discontinuity within continuity. He seeks a harmonization that does not break with the previous pontificate, but that at the same time provides both clarity and direction.

This is where the third characteristic comes into play: institutionality.

As a former prior of a religious congregation, Leo XIV knows that governance cannot be achieved through disruption. So far, he hasn’t created major rifts within the Curia—in fact, he has praised its work—and he won’t likely cause anything like the disruption to curial culture we saw during the reign of his predecessor. The institution, for Leo XIV, always comes first.
For this reason, the Pope has begun to address exceptions—for example, including the Committee for World Children’s Day in the Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life—without, however, upset or disruption.

We should not expect the Pope to revolutionize the Curia, change the apostolic constitution desired by Pope Francis, or suddenly overturn some decisions. He will absorb some decisions, and he will make others, always seeking balance.

The fourth characteristic is one he shares not only with Francis but with all Popes. Leo XIV wants to go wherever God is needed. A series of stages is being planned around the trip to Nicaea for the 1700th anniversary of the First Ecumenical Council, which speaks volumes about the message the Pope wishes to convey. The preceding stage could be in Algeria, in the footsteps of St. Augustine, because it is from there symbolically that Leo XIV wishes to begin, emphasizing his inspiration.

The next stage after Nicaea could be Lebanon—Cardinal Bechara Rai has expressed openness to this possibility—on a trip Pope Francis had wanted to make three years ago. But Lebanon is a symbol for the divided Middle East, a sign that men of different religions can also work together for the common good.

Leo XIV’s pontificate, in short, is a missionary and institutional papacy, one that looks to the peripheries, but without taking its gaze from the center, which is Christ. Leo will take his time to make decisions. His pontificate will be traditional, in some ways.

This is what Leo XIV’s first hundred days at the helm of the Church have told us.