POPE LEO XIV will today address the faithful in St Peter’s Square for the first time since being elected as the new leader of the Catholic Church.
On Thursday evening, the white smoke billowed from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and around an hour later, former Cardinal Robert Prevost was introduced from the central balcony of St Peter’s Basilica as Pope Leo XIV.
The first American pope will make his first public appearance since becoming pontiff from that same balcony at 12pm Rome time (11am Irish time).
He will lead the Regina Caeli (Queen of Heaven) prayer.
Usually, the Angelus prayer would be said on a Sunday but during the Easter season – the 50-day period between Easter Sunday and Pentecost – this is replaced by the prayer dedicated to Mary.
Pope Leo XIV will then deliver a reflection at the end of the Regina Caeli prayer.
First Saturday as Pope
Yesterday turned out out to be a busy day for the new pope, who made a visit to the tomb of his predecessor Pope Francis within the Santa Maria Maggiore.
Vatican News published a photo of the white-robed American pope kneeling before Francis’s simple marble tomb.
Earlier on Saturday, less than 48 hours after he was elected Pope, Leo XIV also made his first visit outside the Vatican, travelling to the Shrine of the Mother of Good Counsel in Genazzano, just outside Rome.
The new pope also met with cardinals yesterday and revealed in this meeting that he chose the papal name Leo “mainly because of Pope Leo XIII’s historic Encyclical Rerum Novarum”.
This document, a response to the state of industrial society in the late 19th century, explicitly outlined worker’s rights to a fair wage, safe working conditions and the right to belong to a trade union.
He remarked that today there is “another industrial revolution in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defence of human dignity, justice and labour”.
Meeting with the press
Elsewhere, Leo XIV will meet the international press on Monday at the Paul VI Audience Hall in the Vatican.
This first meeting with journalists can give a good indication as to how the new pope will carry himself.
When Pope Benedict XVI greeted journalists for the first time in the Paul VI Hall, he took no questions and departed after less than 20 minutes.
But with Pope Francis in 2013, there was a very noticeable step change.
He called for a “poor Church for the poor” and explained that he chose his papal name because of St. Francis of Assisi, who Francis described as a “man of poverty and a man of peace”.
He also spoke about the conclave and revealed that one Cardinal approached Francis when he was elected and “told me not to forget the poor”.
“And that word went in here,” said Francis, pointing to his head.
And while Benedict from a script and promptly departed, Francis spoke mostly off the cuff, was making jokes and smiling throughout, and greeted the service dog of a visually impaired journalist.
Francis also offered a silent “cordial” blessing to the journalists gathered, acknowledging that many gathered were not Catholic.
“Since many of you are not members of the Catholic Church, and others are not believers, I cordially give this blessing silently, to each of you, respecting the conscience of each, but in the knowledge that each of you is a child of God.”
Pope Francis greeting former Cardinal Robert Prevost, now Pope Leo XIV, on 9 Sept, 2023 Alamy Stock Photo
Other items on new pope’s agenda
After meeting the press tomorrow, Leo XIV’s next major item is a meeting with the Vatican’s Diplomatic Corps on Friday, 16 May.
And on Sunday, 18 May, an inaugural Mass will be held in St Peter’s Square to formally mark the beginning of his pontificate.
From there, Leo will hold his first General Audience, which are held on Wednesday mornings at St Peter’s Square,
And on Saturday 24 May he will meet with the Roman Curia, the government of the Catholic Church, and Vatican City State employees.
The following day, Sunday 25 May, the new pope’s routine will be settling into place and he will deliver a Regina Caeli prayer from St Peter’s.
Meanwhile, when a pope dies, all the cardinals and archbishops in charge of departments in the Roman Curia, including the secretary of state, lose their jobs.
The Camerlengo however, Irish-born Cardinal Kevin Farrell who effectively ran the Church during the “sede vacante” period where there was no pope, was an exception to this.
Cardinal Camerlengo Kevin Farrell seals the door to the papal bedroom and studio at the Vatican after the death of Pope Francis Alamy Stock Photo
Leo XIV has said he wants the heads of the Roman Curia to continue in their roles “on a provisional basis”.
The Vatican press office added: “Pope Leo XIV maintains the right to ‘a certain amount of time for reflection, prayer, and dialogue’ before making any “definitive appointments or confirmations.”