Leo XIV, the Pope, called to bring unity.

For the first time in history, the new Pope pronounced his first words as pontiff, reading a written text. Leo XIV presented himself to the world, visibly moved, reading a text he had prepared full of cross-references, explaining who he is and some, at least, of what he wants to do.

The first Pope in history from the United States of America is Robert Francis Prevost. He is 69 years old, an Augustinian, and has been in the Vatican for only two years.

The man who became Pope Leo XIV on Thursday had been a missionary in Peru and later bishop of Chiclayo in the same country. Before that, he had been superior of the Augustinians, based in Rome. He has a solid education: degrees in mathematics and philosophy; and is an expert in canon law.

Above all, he is a man of three worlds.

When the cardinals elected Pope Francis, they gave him the mandate to reform the Curia. There is still a good deal of reforming to do – perhaps even more than there was when Francis took the reins in 2013 – but when the cardinals elected Leo XIV, they were giving him a mandate to bring unity. Cardinal Giovan Battista Re explained this in the Missa Pro Eligendo Romano Pontifice that opened the Conclave.

Re’s pro eligendo homily contained no word or quote regarding Pope Francis, nor even a passing reference. That was already a sign that the cardinals had decided, as a body, to turn the page. The “Franciscan” candidates never gained traction, largely because the liberal wing was divided against itself. All their potential candidates melted like snow in the sun. The silent majority of cardinals from Asia and Africa, frequently ignored in media surveys, were organizing themselves to look at the Church beyond Francis.

Pope Francis’s “guardians of the Revolution” left messages in the media and the homilies of the novemdiales, the Masses for the nine days of official mourning: There is no going back from Pope Francis’s reforms; let’s try not to lose Pope Francis’s legacy; etc.. Those now appear as desperate attempts to stop a wave already moving in another direction.

While it may be too much to say Prevost was already Pope when he entered the Conclave, he certainly was elected with great celerity. His presence, his way of doing things, and even his intervention, had flipped a switch, so to speak. The majority of the cardinals were almost immediately focused on him.

The flag-bearing candidate for the other sidewas from the Philippines, but wasn’t the cardinal from the Philippines who had been the darling of establishment media. The standard-bearer was Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan, president of the bishops’ conference of the Philippines, who had warmed hearts with his speech.

When he received his red hat – it was only in December of last year – David told the faiuthful of his diocese he did not want to be called by the title.

David would not have been a Francis II, in other words, but a second Francis.

Even if only for that reason, David was never a credible candidate. He was more of a candidate who would warm hearts like Pope Francis had done, but the cardinals were looking for a governor, not a cheerleader.

Twelve years of Pope Francis had created a clash of civilizations between the old world, Latin America, and North America. It was time to turn the page on the Francis era, and Prevost was the man with the resume that best fit the job to hand.

The Old World was a bit disillusioned by Francis, who brushed aside the trappings of tradition (when he didn’t bulldoze them). North America felt scorned by the Pope, who came from the antipodes, and Latin America was elated by the fact that it could finally be the center of the world, at least at first.

There was an extreme imbalance, in short.

Pope Francis imposed the Latin American mentality on Rome, not entirely unlike the manner in which Western powers imposed democratic forms of government on former colonial holdings and their peoples, who had no real familiarity with those forms. It was about imposing a universe of symbols on a world that had another universe of symbols. From the beginning of Pope Francis’s pontificate, there was talk of making Latin American theology a source theology, tout court. The theme of synodality in the Latin American sense of the term had been included and transformed into an institution, the world of popular movements, and the Scholas Occurentes had also been brought into the limelight if not the mainstream.

That world had not only come to the Vatican but had been institutionalized by force. The result was topsy turvy.

In addition, Pope Francis’s entire world of reference was one that harbored strong resentment toward the United States and looked with fear at the “theology of prosperity” that he saw emerging in some American evangelical circuits. However reasonable one’s unease with the prosperity gospel, however well-founded one’s fears of American hard power may have been, conflation of the two and reduction of the United States to one or the other or both, was disastrous.

Prevost carries all these worlds within himself.

He comes from North America, he knows the language of South America (and he spoke of synodality, which should be interpreted as a sort of listening and participation), but he is above all profoundly Western. He is a man of America, that is to say of both Americas, but he is, above all, a Western man.

In short, the cardinals looked to him as the man with the pedigree necessary to bring harmony.

It is no coincidence that the word “dialogue” resounded three times in his first speech, just as it is no coincidence that he returned to all the papal symbols, starting with the red mozetta that Pope Francis had refused since his first appearance from the blessing loggia.

Leo is not a Pope of compromise, but a Pope who is called to bring harmony. He is not a Pope of political consensus, either. There was speculation about the presence of Cardinal Parolin on the balcony with him, and many reconstructions spoke of a Parolin “shot” by friendly fire who would have passed his package of votes to Cardinal Prevost.

In reality, Parolin was there because he was the first of the cardinals of the order of bishops, together with the cardinal protodeacon, Mamberti, and the first cardinal of the order of presbyters, Cardinal Puljić. There was nothing electoral, but rather a sense of tradition that had seemed lost and was now being restored.

In the Missa Pro Ecclesia, his first Mass as Pope with all the cardinals, Leo XIV warned against Christians who live as de facto atheists when they consider Jesus a sort of Superman. He expressed his desire to disappear, to leave Christ at the center, and he spoke of Peter’s succession.

In doing so, he marked a precise direction.

The name he chose, the name of Leo, underlines how the Francis pontificate was an experience unique in the history of the Church. Leo hearkens not only to Leo XIII, the father of Catholic Social Teaching in the modern era, but to Leo the Great. We return to the roots now, to boldness in facing unprecedented challenges, openness to the Eastern Churches, mediations for Peace, and even to the reconstitution of a new and doubtless very different res publica Christiana.

Will a New World Pope bring the Old World back to life?

A new chapter begins.