Chicago reacts to homeland Pope Leo: ‘Like the Cubs winning the World Series’

As white smoke billowed from the Vatican in Rome, yellow papal flags whipped within the crisp Lake Michigan breeze in entrance of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Academy on Chicago’s North Side.

Screams of “Habemus Papam!” echoed all through the cafeteria on the Catholic faculty on Thursday afternoon, when information broke that Chicago’s Robert Prevost had transform Pope Leo XIV.

Prevost was once born on Chicago’s South Side and attended Catholic faculty at St Mary of the Assumption, a now defunct parish at the town’s a ways south-east aspect. Prevost studied divinity at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago’s Hyde Park group, and taught at an area Catholic highschool, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.

Despite spending his youth in Peru, the place he labored as a missionary and later archbishop of Chiclayo, Chicagoans celebrated their local son at church buildings and colleges across the town.

Seventh-grader Vincent Wall and eighth-grader Ava Broz have been within the cafeteria at Mount Carmel, the place scholars have been waving US and town of Chicago flags.

“It really feels like a 2016 Cubs World Series,” mentioned Wall, relating to the baseball group that continued an extended drought sooner than a triumphant victory in 2016. “It’s just like, a pope from Chicago is just global, and so is the World Series. It’s crazy.”

Allison Foerster, who teaches Spanish and faith on the faculty, was once getting lunch when she noticed scholars hiking on their desks to check out the display screen taking part in a are living feed of the white smoke. She came upon the pope’s id whilst tracking recess.

“I’m supervising the kids playing soccer and then there’s five [of them] over my shoulder trying to watch,” mentioned Foerster, who performed the inside track on her telephone.

On Tuesday, Wall and Broz participated as narrators in a ridicule conclave at Mount Carmel. Younger scholars wearing scarlet gowns and paper hats filed right into a makeshift Sistine Chapel, the varsity’s auditorium, and mentioned the {qualifications} for the following pope over snacks. The small cardinals have been even flanked by means of a mini Swiss Guard, wearing a swimsuit that instructor Dominic Moretti had ordered from Italy.

“So they knew [today] was a moment of joy and a moment of celebration,” says Foerster.

Like Boston, Chicago boasts one of the most most powerful Catholic contingents within the United States. In the overdue 19th and early 20th centuries, immigrants from Germany, Ireland, Poland and Italy shaped colourful parishes. Today, church spires are as prevalent in Chicago’s city panorama as artwork deco motifs and skyscrapers.

Chicago’s Catholic neighborhood has confronted most of the identical headwinds the church has weathered throughout the United States. In 2022, the Chicago archdiocese unveiled plans to slash its collection of parishes by means of 123. Financial pressures, fewer monks and dwindling mass attendance driven the diocese to consolidate. This March, information from Pew confirmed a 12% drop within the collection of Chicagoans who establish as Christian, in comparison to information from a decade in the past.

Meanwhile, the Church’s persevered combat with sexual abuse scandals comes at a time when secularism is on the upward thrust in America.

But all through town on Thursday, the inside track of a homeland pope had folks in top spirits. Ragen Eggert, a employee on the native sizzling canine stand the Wiener’s Circle, joked with buyers. “It’s officially a sin to have ketchup on a hotdog,” he mentioned, a nod to town’s well-known Chicago-style recipe.

At Holy Name Cathedral, the implementing Gothic Revival church that rose out of the ashes of the Great Chicago fireplace of 1871, vacationers and locals stopped to hope and to honor the brand new pope. Attendees have been buoyed by means of the inside track it could be an American, who they believed would proceed Pope Francis’s innovative imaginative and prescient for the church.

Janet Fink, a parishioner at Holy title, was once positive that Leo would practice in Francis’s footsteps.

“I loved that he [Francis] just embraced everyone, especially the poor and downtrodden, and he was a people’s pope,” she mentioned. “I hope Pope Leo continues to be the people’s pope.”

Fink added that she was once surprised to look now not just a pope from Chicago, however one from the United States. Leo was once extensively thought to be a dark-horse candidate sooner than the conclave, given a historic bias in opposition to opting for a pope from the United States.

“It’s just amazing. I didn’t think I would see it in my lifetime. It’s a wonderful surprise,” Fink mentioned. “I think they’re [the Church] listening to the lay people and I think they want to progress and not go backwards.”

Young grownup Catholics at Holy Name expressed exuberance. Clara Downey, a 24-year-old PhD pupil at Loyola University and a biographer for a cardinal, were waking up at 3.30am every morning looking forward to information from the Vatican. Downey said that Leo is extra reasonable than Pope Francis. But she famous that Francis should have had self assurance in him, since he appointed him as prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, which supervises the number of new bishops.

“Wonderful news that it is Bob Prevost. He’s a wonderful man, great pick,” Downey mentioned. “It is I think indicative that the college [of cardinals] is looking to not rupture much from where Francis is taking the church.”

Like Francis, Leo is readily following in predecessor’s footsteps as probably the most meme-able pontiff, no less than within the Chicago house.

“I already saw somebody post an AI image of him with a bottle of Malört,” Downey mentioned, relating to the sour wormwood liquor standard in Chicago.

For some agnostics, Pope Leo’s announcement was once a decision again to the church.

Kara Baekey, who was once visiting Chicago for her daughter Charlotte’s commencement from Loyola, mentioned their circle of relatives was once now not non secular however was once following the conclave and favored Pope Francis’s ideologies. The information felt private to Baekey, whose folks met in Chicago, and signaled hope in a time of political uncertainty in the United States. She sought after to discover a Catholic church the place she may pray for her nation, including that she was once involved in regards to the “atrocities” Donald Trump is bringing.

“I feel like it’s kind of magical to be here in Chicago today,” Baekey mentioned. “I hope that this pope will help to take our country on the correct path.”