Newly elected Pope Leo XIV
by William Ysaguirre (Freelance Writer)
VATICAN CITY, Rome, Thurs. May 8, 2025
White smoke rising from the Vatican on Thursday morning, May 8, signaled that a new pope has been selected. The cardinals’ paper ballots which were submitted during the voting process were burnt with a chemical ensuring complete combustion to produce white smoke. After that signal made the public aware of the selection, it later became known that the new head of the church is the first American to be elected as pope, Robert Francis Prevost. Prevost, who has taken the name Pope Leo XIV, was born in Chicago, USA, but served for a number of years in Peru and was reportedly first brought to the Vatican by Pope Francis in 2023.
The conclave of 133 cardinals younger than 80 years who were eligible to participate in the voting process to select the pope spent the night at Casa Santa Marta, after their first round of voting failed to choose a new pope, signaled by the black smoke on Wednesday evening, and they remained cloistered in the Sistine Chapel of the Vatican until the new pope was elected early this morning.
This was done by secret ballot, with each cardinal writing the name of his choice on a piece of paper and trying to disguise his handwriting as much as possible so that the balloting might remain secret.
Cardinal Giovanni Battista RE – Deacon of the College of Cardinals reads the Homily before Conclave begins
The election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio’s successor took even less time than the five days it took for him to become Pope Francis. The cardinals have met 12 times since Pope Francis was elected, but not all had gotten to know each other well, and there were nearly 30 possible candidates for pope.
After being chosen, a new pope is customarily moved to the Room of Tears to remove his scarlet cassock of a cardinal and to don the white robes of the pontiff as well as change his skull cap, his zuchetto, for a white one, and the white mitre of his office, before he greets the faithful from the balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square.
Newly elected Pope Leo XIV, Cardinal Robert F. Prevost of the U.S., appears on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, May 8, 2025. Francesco Sforza, Vatican Media Handout Via REUTERS
The Room of Tears is so called because it is where the new pope will first confront the full enormity of his new office, of keeping the faith for 1.6 billion Catholics and promoting the Christian doctrine of peace, in a world rife with conflict and strife. In fact, while the atrocities committed in the Gaza were muted for a while, and the Trump administration is trying to broker an end to the war in the Ukraine, new missile attacks by India against Pakistan in the disputed region of the Kashmir threaten a conflict between two nuclear powers that could escalate into something far worse. Trump’s bellicose stance towards America’s former allies does not inspire confidence in the prospects for harmonious relations in the future.
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