Janinna Sesa (left) and Robert Prevost pose for a photo in Rome in 2023.
Janinna Sesa
hide
tilting legend
Janinna Sesa
Shortly after walking on the balcony overlooking Saint-Pierre square, the new Pope, Leo XIV, took a moment to thank the city where he was bishop for almost a decade.
“To all of you, but especially to my beloved diocese in Chiclayo in Peru,” he said in Spanish. “When a faithful people accompanied their bishop, shared their faith and gave so much to continue to be a Church faithful to Jesus Christ.”
Janinna Sesa says that the city broke out to celebrate when she heard her name on the world scene. SESA is the former chiclayo director of CaritasThe International Humanitarian Aid Organization of the Catholic Church.
With the bishop of the time, Robert Frances, SESA worked on help efforts to combat catastrophic floods, an epidemic of dengue and later the worst of the cocvid-19 pandemic.
“We saw a bishop who put a helmet, boots and came out to meet people, very close, very, very humble with everyone,” said Sesa. “Of those who occupied important positions to the most humble people.”
At the height of the cocovated pandemic, the chiclayo region of the coast, in northern Peru
“Thanks to his efforts, we managed to buy not only a plant, but two oxygen plants. This saved many lives,” shared SESA with NPR from Peru. “Oxygen has been made available free of charge to all those who needed it, especially the most vulnerable.”
In 2023, the bishop left Chiclayo for Rome, where the late Pope Frances promoted prevost at the archbishop. Later that year, SESA said that she visited Prevost in her new palatial office in Italy where the two remembered their years in Peru. She says that she found her busy but calm and contained in her new role.
SESA says that Chiclayo will continue to root us and pray for the new Pope when he enters a new period of demanding service.
“He can count on our prayers because it will also be a difficult route to come for him,” she said. “Many prayers of all chiclayo he carries in his heart.”
The radio version of this story was produced by Claire Murashima and Carla Esteves. The digital article was published by Obed Manuel.
