The announcement that Vice President JD Vance would attend the opening mass of Pope Leo XIV included a simple line.
“Pope Leo XIV is the first American Pope. Vice President Vance is the first Catholic convert to serve as vice president,” said the White House notice.
It was neutral, but counts. The first American Pope occupies the headquarters of San Pedro at a time when conservative Catholicism has been the political force in the United States, embodied in the first man in the presidency row. The relationship between the two will be one of the most watched developments of Pope Leo’s papacy.
The selection of Pope Leo’s cardinals proves the tense relationship between the bishop of Rome and the American right wing. Only four on Sunday, Mr. Vance shake hands with a Pope who had publicly punished his theology and position on immigration, and who faced the frustration of traditionalist Catholics. This Sunday comes to a leader who seems to share many of the opinions of his predecessor, including direct criticism or Mr. Vance in the Social Networks account eliminated by AUW associated with his name.
The main American conservative Catholics often say they don’t know Pope Leo personally. However, although some had different first options for the papacy, Pope Leo has begun to position himself as a conciliatory modification force. Some
“It seems to be a man or a deep prayer and reflection that believes in the service of the ethers and the fidelity to the doctrine and constant teaching of the Church,” said Ashley McGuare, the main member of the Catholic Association. “I am optimistic that unity can bring to church through the clear and compassionate leadership of the faithful.”
Some activists point out that they love the symbolism of Pope Leo’s coat of arms, with his message of unity and communion in the Church. He also invited the leader of Opus Dei, a Catholic group with strong conservative support, for a letter meeting, “in which the Pope expressed his lock and affection,” the group said in a statement.
Pope Leo’s approach in the dignity of the worker in the modern world, and the indications that will focus on work and society, can be partular connection points.
Pope Leo and Mr. Vance share a hero in San Agustín, if sometimes they can interpret it in a divided way. The day Mr. Vance became Catholicism through the study with Dominican friars, he chose Agustín as his employer, after having found inspiration in his Treaty of the 5th century, “City of God”, which challenged the romantic class of Rome. “Our society is more than the sum of its economic statistics,” Vance said later.
The Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is Mr. Vance set in the Vatican, has previously indicated to the historical of Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum, who addressed the needs and dignity of the workers, as basic for their views on economic reform.
When Pope Leo with ambassadors on Friday, they asked governments to “build harmonious and peaceful civil societies,” and then cited a line of that nineteenth -century text that sounds similar to the economic popism of Catholic law.
“This can be achieved above all by investing in the family, founded on the stable union between a man and a woman, a small but genuine society, and before all civil society,” he said. But immediately followed him with the reminder to respect the dignity of the unemployed, “citizens and immigrants equally.”
His attention to the dignity of the worker appeals through political divisions.
“The fact that it is focused on technology and AI, the problems of the day, says John Cannon, the founder of Sent, a network for Catholic business leaders, who were at the events of the week of Rome for America before the conclave.
For some traditionalists, Pope Leo is unique because he is a strong administrator and a missionary. “The fact that they have both in a person is very strange,” said Cannon.
The representative Riley Moore, Republican of West Virginia, presented a resolution in Congress to honor Pope Leo, saying that he exemplified “humility and courage.” (Before Cardinal Robert Francis Prevosts became Pope, his social media account shared criticism about the Trump administration positions about immigration. Last month, representative Moore posted on social networks a photo of himself with two thumbs up while standing in front of a CECOT prison in the people, where the Trump administration had sent sports).
A bipartisan group asked the president of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, to invite Pope Leo to go to Congress. “An address of His Holiness would serve as a powerful reminder of our commitments shared with peace, service to others and moral leadership,” he wrote.
Some conservatives who openly opposed Pope Leo’s elections have softened his approach. Days before the white smoke, Catholic Vote’s media arm suggested that the liberal and conservative media had coordinated a campaign to press by Cardinal Prevost.
“I am certainly not a fan of this type,” Josh Mercer said in a podcast, who founded Catholic vote with Brian Burch, nominated for President Trump to be ambassador to the Holy See. “Obviously, the reason it is being pushed is because it hears being a little more liberal tasty that could continue with what Francis is doing.”
But several days after the elections, Mercer pointed out in an opinion essay with Steve Cortes, a former Trump advisor, who seemed that Pope Leo subscribed to “principles of the economic agenda of patriotic populism.”
