From Chicago to Châteauneuf-du-Pape: What does a pope’s hometown reveal?

When white smoke billowed across Rome last week, heralding the election of a new pope, the world turned its gaze to Vatican City. However, the story of the Catholic Church’s new leader began far from St Peter’s Square. In a historic first, the papacy now belongs to an American.

Pope Leo XIV – born 4,800 miles away in South Side Chicago – addressed a crowd of over 40,000 people from the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica on May 8th. His initial words were not in English, but a mix of Italian and Spanish, a nod to his 20+ year career in Peru, suggesting a multi-national identity.

This raises the question: how does a pope’s hometown shape his leadership – and how are those hometowns changed in return? Wadowice, Poland, the birthplace of Pope John Paul II, transformed into a hub of Catholic pilgrimage after his election. In contrast, despite serving as Archbishop of Buenos Aires for over a decade, Pope Francis never returned to Argentina as pope.

With the recent ascent of Leo XIV, attention now turns to his Chicago roots. Will the streets of South Side one day become a pilgrimage site like Wadowice? Or will it remain a respected but not venerated point of origin, akin to Francis’s Buenos Aires? Time will tell.

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