Thursday, Cardinal Robert F. Prevost was presented to the world as the 267th pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church and the first American pope, taking the name of Leo XIV.
For Catholic theologians, the meaning of the name was obvious, the new pope attaching himself to one of the fundamental figures of modern Catholic social education, Pope Leo XIII, who pleaded for the rights of the poor and workers in the midst of a deep economic change.
Leo XIII was pontiff from 1878 to 1903, encompassing the golden age in the United States and the second industrial revolution around the world. It was a period of abuse of work and operating – before minimum wage, attention to labor security or compulsory days of leave.
The workers, in particular in Europe, became disillusioned by the Church and the perception which he was linked with the rich and the elite, declared Father Kenneth Himes, a retired professor of theology of the Boston College who wrote and published numerous books on Catholic social education.
“Leo has heard of American bishops if he should oppose unions and raise questions about workers’ rights, this could also transform (American Catholics) into disillusioned members of the Church,” said Himes.
To fill the chasm, Leo XIII in 1891 used the Papacy platform to offer an animated defense of the union organization and the rights of workers in its seminal encyclical, “rerum novarum”.
In this document, he condemned the “wealthy owners and all the masters” who sought to take advantage of “the destitute and the destitute”. His writing launched an orientation of the last days by successive popes on the subclasses, capitalism and the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a few.
“A pope after the others made an encyclical to mark the rights of the poor,” said James F. Keenan, SJ, Jesuit priest and theology teacher at Boston College. “We have always had a long social tradition of the Church … But it was only when Pope Leo XIII began the tradition of the way the popes needed to deal with the conditions of the poor and the worker.”
While Leo was motivated by a moral position around social justice, he said Himes, he was also “pastoral”, aimed at ensuring that the Catholic Church was listening to social currents.
“Leo feared that the Church would become a church of the elites, not a church in the working class,” said Himes, and wanted to avoid a repetition of the French Revolution, when the Church was considered on the side of the aristocrats and the monarchs.
“If it came, we hadn’t learned anything,” said Himes, “Leo was afraid that the Church does not recover.”
Several popes explicitly paid tribute to the writings of Leo XIII.
In 1931, Pope Pius XI published his encyclical “Quadragesimo Anno” or “40th anniversary”, commemorating the release of Rerum Novarum with expanded lessons on work and how “the human dignity of the worker must be recognized”.
“OCTOGESIMA Adveniens” of Pope Paul VI, or “80th anniversary”, advocates equality and addresses young people and women. The legislation, he wrote, should recognize “the independence of women as a person, and its equal rights to participate in cultural, economic, social and political life”.
In 1991, Pope John Paul II published “Centesimus Annus” or “100th anniversary”, writing on devastating poverty in developing countries as well as global economic, cultural and spiritual poverty caused by forces such as “consumerism”.
For Keenan, the choice of “Leo” is parallel and completes the choice of the previous pope of “Francis”. When he was elected in 2013, former Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio said that he honored Saint-François d’Assise, known for his dedication to the deprived.
“Francis was someone who took care of the poor, who was exercised to them, he collected funds for them, visited them and the anointed”, while Leo “argued for his rights,” said Keenan.
And thus, the new pope meant his desire to rely on the inheritance of Francis.
“He chose what he was – a defender – and someone who doesn’t just want to be with the poor, but defend him,” added Keenan.
In his first address Thursday, standing on a balcony overlooking Saint-Pierre square in the city of the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV honored his immediate predecessor, speaking of building bridges and being “a church that always seeks peace, which is always looking for charity, which is always looking to be close to those who suffer”.
“He spoke of a way of proceeding which was completely collective,” said Keenan, who considered the history of the new pope as an asset.
In addition to serving as a bishop in Peru, the origin of Chicago was elected by his colleagues priests to direct the Augustinian religious order. In 2023, Francis appointed him prefect of the Dicastery for the bishops, who oversees the selection of bishops worldwide and monitored the performance of bishops.
“This administrative capacity of the new Pope is very important – and it brings part of the order that people were looking for and do not suppress the inheritance of Pope Francis, but makes him more palpable,” said Keenan.
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