Europe | Habemus papam Americanum

What it means to have an American on the throne of St Peter

By choosing Robert Prevost the cardinals seek unity in a fractured church

Newly elected Pope Leo XIV, Cardinal Robert Prevost of the United States appears on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican.
Photograph: Reuters

DONALD TRUMP was not in the end chosen to be pope, as he had jokingly suggested. But on May 8th the cardinals of the Roman Catholic church did elect an American, breaking a taboo against the identification of a geopolitical superpower with a spiritual one.

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