The Vatican delivered an unprecedented look at the moments after Cardinal Robert Prevost, was elected by the College of Cardinals under the imposing ceilings of the Sistine Chapel.
After a prayer at the altar, Pope Leo XIV proceeds down the aisle to thunderous applause from his colleagues and entering a room for private prayer kneeling on a prie-dieu. The new pope then embraced each of the 133 cardinal-electors who made him bishop of Rome.
Born in Chicago, Leo XIV is the first-ever American pope.
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After rising through the ranks of the Augustinian Order, Prevost was appointed an administrator at the Diocese of Chiclayo, and a year later made a bishop by Pope Francis.
Close allies, Prevost oversaw many of Francis’ most radical reforms to the Catholic Church.