Robert Francis Prevost was born on 14 September 1955 in Chicago. He was the youngest of three boys. His father, Louis Marius Prevost, a former member of the US Navy during the Second World War, became a teacher and later a headteacher. His mother, Mildred Agnes Martínez, worked as a librarian. Both were deeply involved in their parish. The future Pope therefore grew up in a fairly traditional Catholic family, but his intellectual journey held a small surprise: he did not begin by studying theology.
In 1977, he graduated from Villanova University in Pennsylvania with a degree in mathematics, whilst also studying philosophy. This detail is by no means trivial. Before becoming the ‘man in white’ at the Vatican, Leo XIV was thus trained in a discipline based on logic, proof and problem-solving. That same year, at the age of 22, he entered the novitiate of the Order of Saint Augustine. He took his first vows in 1978 and his solemn vows in 1981.
After studying theology in Chicago, he went to Rome to study canon law at the Angelicum, the Pontifical University of St Thomas Aquinas. He was ordained a priest in June 1982. He obtained a licentiate in canon law in 1984 and went on to prepare a doctoral thesis on the role of the local prior in the Order of Saint Augustine. His profile was already taking shape: a man who was at once a religious, a lawyer and an administrator, far more methodical than flamboyant.
But it was in Peru that his life truly took on a new dimension. In 1985, he joined the Augustinian mission in Chulucanas, in the Piura region. After a brief return to the United States, he set off again in 1988, this time for Trujillo. He was to remain there for over a decade, holding a variety of posts that demonstrate the breadth of his work: formator of young religious, prior, lecturer in canon law, moral theology and patristics, judicial vicar, seminary director and parish priest. In particular, he carried out his ministry in a parish situated in a poor suburb of Trujillo.
This long period in Peru is probably the most significant part of his life story if one is to understand the man who became Pope. Prevost is not merely an American prelate who undertook a few missions abroad. He spent a considerable part of his ecclesiastical life in Peru, to the extent that he was granted Peruvian citizenship in 2015. His personal journey therefore spans the United States, Latin America and Rome.
In 1998, his role took on a new dimension. He was elected superior of the Augustinian Province of Chicago and returned to the United States. Three years later, his fellow friars elected him Prior General of the Order of Saint Augustine. He then led the Order worldwide for two successive terms, from 2001 to 2013. This role took him on numerous journeys, allowing him to gain an insider’s view of a wide variety of Catholic communities.
Then came his return to Peru. In November 2014, Pope Francis appointed him Apostolic Administrator of Chiclayo and Titular Bishop of Sufar. He was ordained a bishop the following month and officially became Bishop of Chiclayo in September 2015. He also joined the Peruvian Bishops’ Conference, becoming its second vice-president in 2018.
It was Francis who ultimately steered his destiny towards Rome. In January 2023, he summoned Prevost to the Vatican and entrusted him with one of the most influential posts in the Curia: Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops. This institution is notably involved in the process of selecting new bishops across the world. Francis created him a cardinal in September of the same year. Within a few years, the missionary from Trujillo had thus become one of the men at the very heart of the functioning of the universal Church.
On 8 May 2025, the conclave elected him Pope. Robert Francis Prevost became Leo XIV, the 267th Pope of the Catholic Church, the first Pope from the United States and the first member of the Order of Saint Augustine to ascend to the papacy.
His story is, in fact, more unique than the label of ‘American Pope’ that was immediately attached to him. Admittedly, he was born in Chicago. But his adult life unfolded across three worlds: the United States of his childhood and education, Peru of his missionary work and episcopate, and Rome of canon law and subsequently the governance of the Church. Before becoming Leo XIV, Robert Prevost spent most of his life moving between the front line and the institution, between Peruvian parishes and the corridors of the Vatican. And it is undoubtedly this dual experience that provides the most interesting key to understanding him today.
