An American first Pope? Cardinal Robert Prevost

Vatican City – Of the 266 potatoes directed by the Catholic Church, none of them has been from the United States. While the young youth of the Nation means less than 20 of those men treated after the declaration of independence of the United States in 1776, a prominent American bishop has a possible explanation of the lack of an American leader of the world’s Catholics until now.

Robert Barron, bishop of the Diocese of Winona -rochester in Minnesota, was appointed less than a week ago by President Trump to the new White House Freedom Commission.

This week, however, it is in the Vatican with hundreds of other prelates such as Cardinal voters gather For him conclave To choose from A new Pontiff To happen to Pope Francis.

Barron has spent days talking to the cardinals, including the 133 cardinal voters in charge of Choose the new Pope – While trying to discover among them, it is best to lead the church below.

“Cardinal George of Chicago, from Happy Memoria, was one of my great mentors, and said:” Look, until the United States goes into a political decline, there will be no American pope. “And his point was that if the United States is directing the world politically, culturally, economically, they do not want the United States to handle the world religiously, so I think there is something really, that we are a superpower and so dominant, they do not want to give us a superpower church “.

That said, an American name has appeared repeatedly in the midst of gossip on the main contenders for the role of Pontiff: Cardinal Robert Prevost.

• What do Catholics want in their next Pope?

Undoubtedly, it is qualified, since the only clear grades for the role of the pontiff are that candidates are male and Roman Catholics. But emerge at the top, with the necessary support of just over two thirds of the voters of the voting cardinals, it will require much more than eligibility.

Originally from Chicago, Prevost is the head of the church dicastery for bishops. The powerful position means that it supervises the selection of new bishops.

For any cardinal voters who can be turned off by the American Premost nationality, it is not the only one. He is a double citizen, who has nationality in both the United States and Peru, where he served for many years.

• LGBTQ Catholics expect inclusion under New Pope

While Premost is generally seen as a centrist, in some key social issues that looks as progressive. For a long time he has accepted marginalized groups, very similar to Francis, which defended the migrants and the poor.

But, also as Pope Francis, the native of Illinois opposes to order women as deacons, for example, so at that point he is seen as conservative in the doctrine of the Church.

Tucker Reals contributed to this report.

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