On Thursday, Robert Francis Prevost was introduced in the world as Pope Leo XIV.
But as recently as last week, he was a low-profile cardinal who just went out to eat with a friend in Rome.
The friend, the Reverend Art Purcaro, an assistant -President and deputy professor at Villanova University, had traveled to Italy to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his ordination as a priest. He was planning to have dinner with his family in Sor’eva, a traditional Roman restaurant on the Tiber, not far from Vatican city. And he wanted his good friend Cardinal Prevost, just known to him as Bob.
The Cardinal was unable to attend the dinner because of the novemialles, the nine days of mourning and masses that were held in honor of Pope Francis, who died on 21 April.
But when dinner completed, Father Purcaro remembered, in Walked Bob. He held a black umbrella while fought outside of a rainy evening.
“This is the type of person who is Bob Prevost,” said Father Purcaro on Thursday in a telephone interview. “He just came in.”
The two priests have known each other for decades. They worked together in Peru and later spent time together working in Rome. Father Purcaro eventually returned to Villanova – the same school that the Pope visited as a student.
Father Purcaro described the new pope as a non -ambitarian person, both reserved and prayed.
“Some people would emphasize the reserved aspect of his personality, but that is not about who Bob is,” he said.
“Bob cares a lot about people, especially those who have been omitted,” he added and noticed that it came through in their work in Peru.
He praised his friend’s willingness “to leave every personal ambition, his family, his capacities, to hire them from others, to go to a foreign nation, to become a bishop in a foreign country and to become a Peruvian citizen so that he could serve as one for people.”
Another old friend, the Reverend Robert Hagan, said that Robert Prevost was his mentor and superior when he studied to become a priest in Racine, Wis., In the late nineties.
They watched together in Chicago Bulls competitions and were checked in over the years over the success of the Basketball Team for men in Villanova, which they both attended.
“He had a twinkle in his eyes, a serenity in his face. He is a man who is centered. He was not about the drama. He was calm,” said Father Hagan, who is now previously responsible for the St. Augustine Order in the Philadelphia area.
Hours after the new pope was announced, Father Hagan still had trouble keeping his friend’s new name straight. “I think of him as a Bob,” he said, adding that he was trying to start herself. “When he appeared on that balcony, it was as if a family member appeared.”
The interest in Pope Leo XIV, and in the people who knew him earlier in his life, has been intense. A few hours after the pope was announced, Father Hagan said he received 351 texts and 400 e -mails about the news.
But he never saw a career that has turned off a climb to power.
“The papacy is certainly not something I could ever see Bob Prevost,” said Father Hagan. “I think he just did what he felt that God called him to do.”
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