debut: 2/16/17
39,431 runs
Pope Leo XIV’s unexpected New Orleans Creole background excites city’s large Catholic community
When Father Tony Ricard watched Pope Leo XIV deliver his first address to the faithful Thursday in St. Peter’s Square, he felt an instant kinship.“When he came to the balcony, I looked up, and I was like, ‘That dude looks like he could be my brother,’” said Ricard, a New Orleans Catholic priest with a Creole background.“And that’s before we even knew what his heritage was.”As it turns out, Robert Francis Prevost, who became the first elected Pope from the United States, has Creole grandparents who lived in New Orleans, a genealogist says.The newly elected pontiff is not known to have publicly commented on his Creole ancestry, which includes people of mixed Spanish or French and Black descent. And the family did not identify as Black, his brother told The New York Times.
Pope Leo XIV’s grandparents on his mother’s side lived in New Orleans before they migrated to Chicago, where his mother, Mildred Martinez Prevost, was born in 1912, said Jari C. Honora, a family historian at the Historic New Orleans Collection who shared his research and records with CNN.Leo’s maternal grandparents, Joseph and Louise Martinez, are listed as Black in a Census record from 1900. Joseph is recorded as a cigar maker born in “Hayti.” The Census record shows the couple as living in New Orleans’ 7th Ward, historically a melting pot of cultures in the Crescent City.Honora also shared a marriage certificate for Mildred’s parents and a photo of a family grave site that shows her parents’ name.
“The family were free people of color prior to the Civil War. When they move to Chicago between 1910 and 1912, they ‘passed’ into the White world,” Honora said.John Prevost, the new pope’s older brother, confirmed that his maternal grandparents came from Haiti but told CNN he didn’t know much more about the family’s background.“There wasn’t a whole lot spoken about roots in our day,” he said, noting the grandparents on his father’s side came to the US as orphans without any documentation of their ethnic history.“I guess we have to start calling him the Gumbo Pope,” Ricard said, “because he’s a little bit of everything mixed together.”
When Father Tony Ricard watched Pope Leo XIV deliver his first address to the faithful Thursday in St. Peter’s Square, he felt an instant kinship.“When he came to the balcony, I looked up, and I was like, ‘That dude looks like he could be my brother,’” said Ricard, a New Orleans Catholic priest with a Creole background.“And that’s before we even knew what his heritage was.”As it turns out, Robert Francis Prevost, who became the first elected Pope from the United States, has Creole grandparents who lived in New Orleans, a genealogist says.The newly elected pontiff is not known to have publicly commented on his Creole ancestry, which includes people of mixed Spanish or French and Black descent. And the family did not identify as Black, his brother told The New York Times.
Pope Leo XIV’s grandparents on his mother’s side lived in New Orleans before they migrated to Chicago, where his mother, Mildred Martinez Prevost, was born in 1912, said Jari C. Honora, a family historian at the Historic New Orleans Collection who shared his research and records with CNN.Leo’s maternal grandparents, Joseph and Louise Martinez, are listed as Black in a Census record from 1900. Joseph is recorded as a cigar maker born in “Hayti.” The Census record shows the couple as living in New Orleans’ 7th Ward, historically a melting pot of cultures in the Crescent City.Honora also shared a marriage certificate for Mildred’s parents and a photo of a family grave site that shows her parents’ name.
“The family were free people of color prior to the Civil War. When they move to Chicago between 1910 and 1912, they ‘passed’ into the White world,” Honora said.John Prevost, the new pope’s older brother, confirmed that his maternal grandparents came from Haiti but told CNN he didn’t know much more about the family’s background.“There wasn’t a whole lot spoken about roots in our day,” he said, noting the grandparents on his father’s side came to the US as orphans without any documentation of their ethnic history.“I guess we have to start calling him the Gumbo Pope,” Ricard said, “because he’s a little bit of everything mixed together.”
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