The Battle Begins Within Pope Leo XIV

He's James Martin's Choice. But Is He Also Cardinal Burke's?

Everyone was predicting a liberal Francis 2.0, like Cardinals Tagle or Parolin or a conservative tradition-minded Cardinal like Robert Sarah to come out of the conclave as the next Pope. Oh, and obviously, whoever was chosen wouldn’t be an American.

A mere day into the new pontificate, ironically, the end result was all of these, and also none of them in the person of ROBERT Francis Prevost and his choice of the name of Leo XIV. Prevost, an American citizen who’s nonetheless spent most of his life outside of the U.S., is a man named Robert, with the middle name Francis.

I admit. I’m disappointed. I got my hopes up with all the rumors throughout the two weeks leading up to the conclave that we had a real chance at influencing it, and that someone like Cardinals Peter Erdo or Robert Sarah had a real chance.

Cardinal Prevost was on my mind leading up to the conclave as several Catholic podcasts mentioned him to be either a potential “moderate” compromise candidate between the various factions of cardinals or a Trojan horse for the progressives, including the St. Gallen Mafia that backed Pope Francis’s election. NPR not so subtly choosing to feature a recording of him giving his conclave-entering-oath the day the conclave started tinged me with the guess that somebody or some organization was behind the otherwise little-talked-about and unpredicted figure.

We could go through the negatives of Cardinal Prevost’s known background, backers, and priorities. They are abundant. Leo XIV seems to be Fr. James Martin and Cardinal Cupich’s preferred candidate, a lover of synodality, a promoter of Communion for the divorced and remarried, and a chief tool of Francis’s heavy-handed “reforms” in his role in the Dicastery for Bishops.¹ The College of Cardinals Report on him is also rather sour, and, where it’s not abjectly bad, it seems almost purposely vague.

But even as my heart sank when I realized that the “Robertus” I had heard mentioned on the radio was Prevost rather than Sarah, the first day has been, on the whole, rather positive, as most of you are probably aware.

Leo XIII is just about my all-time favorite Pope, certainly at least in his respect as a theologian, and Cardinal Prevost’s choice of this name probably doesn’t count for nothing. Neither does his wearing all the traditional papal vestments in stark contrast to Francis:

His Latin Urbi et Orbi blessing, his first Papal mass (mostly), and his choice to again live in the traditional Apostolic Palace all seem good signs, alongside the rumor (it’s just a rumor, but hopeful) that Leo XIV celebrates the Traditional Latin Mass on occasion.

My views, informed by many a trad-Catholic podcast over the last 36 hours, are cautiously optimistic, glad that Pope Leo, at the very least, offers us new possibilities, whereas we all knew all too well by 2019 where Francis stood on every issue. Michael Matt’s immediate opinions right after the conclave are very much like mine today.

The aesthetics have been positive, and my heart, first deeply sunk, now mostly wants to like Leo XIV, but in the back of my head, I can't help but worry that there is a psy-op of sorts going on for us to see Leo XIV in a particular light.

The Negatives

I'm terrified of psy-ops. The conclave was full of psy-ops (targeted psychological and narrative trickery and warfare) in all directions, and one view of the conclave’s outcome now that we’re past it, is that we were psy-oped (tricked) into thinking that Tagle and Parolin were going to be the frontrunners, in order to make us breathe a false sigh of relief when the master manipulators of the process gave us Prevost.²

I just fervently hope we aren't going to be psy-oped again, and the fact that James Martin and Cupich are overjoyed is concerning. Could Leo XIV’s selection and his appearance thus far merely be the facade of a return to tradition and doctrinal clarity, aimed at making us all more compliant and dropping our guard?

We also don’t want to psy-op ourselves through an excess of false hope into believing that Leo XIV is something that he isn’t. Perhaps the real psy-op and demonic attack on each of us and the Church as a whole will be through such forms of self-delusion. We need to be realistic and prudent.

Cardinal Prevost is not the guy we were hoping for and likely won’t be the type of Leo XIV that many of us had predicted or wanted. But is he a compromise who could, if swayed by our pressure and the Holy Spirit, be a great boon to the Church, or is he, on the other hand, a Trojan horse who will continue the doctrinal revolutions attempted under Francis?

With little to go on in Leo XIV’s first days in the Seat of Peter, analysis of the conclave itself (leaks and rumors) is the only real data we have to make a judgment.

We know that Cupich and James Martin have been very supportive of Prevost, making it seem obvious that Prevost is a pure leftie, pushed by the St. Gallen Mafia and the Cardinals Cupich and Maradiaga.

A bunch of smiling liberal cardinals

Was Prevost the liberal cardinals’ real choice the whole time, however? The psy-op interpretation of events, that liberals merely want us to “think” we got a more conservative Pope, would argue for this, and that Tagle and Parolin were merely “distractions” meant to make us see Prevost as moderate compared to them. Prevost, then, would have been the liberal candidate the whole time and not merely a compromise. Scant conservative votes for Sarah, Burke, Erdo, and Pizzaballa or the like were the opposition the entire time to a united liberal front that allowed the conclave to close quickly.

Cardinal Dolan: The Kingmaker

But leaks that came out today offer a different interpretation of events, seeing New York’s Cardinal Dolan (as well as Cardinal Burke!) as the kingmakers rallying support behind Prevost, making Leo XIV appear to be a real compromise candidate in a way that actually bodes far more positively.

According to the Italian newspaper il-Giornale, Cardinals Parolin, Aveline, and Grech were the real first choices of the liberals:

Parolin had a certain package of votes, it is said between forty and fifty, in any case not enough to reach the quorum. The problem is that in the first vote it was discovered that another candidate, Prevost, had captured many consensuses in the shadows. The Bergoglians presented themselves divided into different groups and were unable to propose an alternative: for example the Frenchman, also highly rated, Jean-Marc Aveline or the Maltese Mario Grech.

Also offside was Pierbattista Pizzaballa, who comes from Jerusalem, one of the hottest areas on earth, and was therefore inevitably judged too political.

Dolan, according to many observers, has managed to attract voters [for Prevost] from North and South America, especially English-speaking voters, or rather those linked to the Commonwealth, in short the old British Empire, from South Africa to India and the Tonga Islands.

Rumors are that the cardinal from Vicenza had reached an agreement, a sort of ticket, with the Filipino Luis Tagle. Another almost favorite on the eve.

But when put to the test, the agreement did not hold up. And Robert Prevost became the Pope of the First World voted by the cardinals of the Third World.³

So if Prevost was seen as a possible choice on the first ballot, he had to have gotten at least 30 votes to look like he could stand a chance next to Parolin’s 40. Suppose that there were around 30 total for Aveline, Grech, and Tagle combined, the key candidates for Pope Francis’s most die-hard followers. Erdo, Pizzaballa, and Sarah, or those conservative candidates like them, probably didn’t get zero votes each. 33 votes remain for them or those like them to have split up. But various charts of the voting makeup of the cardinals⁴ suggest that there are at least 50 “conservatives.” The fact that these probably wouldn’t have voted for the most Francis-like candidates would lead us to see that Prevost had to have gotten some conservative support early on.

This means that the shift through the later ballots towards Prevost’s ultimate win of at least 89-44 came at the expense of progressives shifting their votes from Parolin, Tagle, etc., as much if not more than conservatives shifting their vote from conservative candidates.

If il-Giornale’s rumors are to be believed, this means that the liberals folded first, and compromised on Prevost as the most liberal guy they could persuade the conservatives and moderates to support. Yes, some conservatives had to have folded, and quickly—obviously there weren’t 44 cardinals willing to hold out past four ballots for an Erdo or Sarah. However, the fact that they quit so quickly suggests that there was conservative openness toward Prevost from before the conclave started.

As il-Giornale argues, this seems to have come about through the moderate but slightly traditional Cardinal Dolan⁵ mediating undecided cardinals over time towards Prevost as much if not more than support he received from liberals like Cupich. Dolan himself hints at his role in this interview:

Cardinal Burke’s Choice?

But the story gets weirder. Apparently Prevost was seen meeting with the archtraditionalist Burke before the conclave:

There are several steps of guesswork here, but if one takes this hint to its logical conclusion, perhaps Cardinal Burke, for some reason, was promoting Prevost?

If this is true, then Prevost received support from conservatives almost the entire time, making it likely that his ultimate win was less a conservative fold than his being the conservative, or moderate, or consensus choice all along:

There are dark interpretations of this. Perhaps this much-talked-about pre-conclave Cardinal Burke meeting came out of the realization that Prevost is the most conservative cardinal that the liberals were willing to support. Given Prevost’s background and connections to James Martin and Cupich, this is depressing.

But a balanced perspective is that Cardinal Burke (and the conservatives he likely brought around to supporting Prevost) know something about him that our paranoia is overlooking. Perhaps the first few days of a more traditional and conciliatory style aren’t a facade. Perhaps Pope Leo doesn’t really hate us. Perhaps, as the original pureveyor of the much-talked-about report that Lei XIV has celebrated the TLM, also relayed to me, Prevost is far more serious, devout, and traditional than his liberal supporters like James Martin thought:

He goes on to talk about Leo XIV’s doctrinal conservatism:

According to @tradcathdixie’s contacts in Rome, corroborated by several others, there seems to be hope that Pope Leo XIV could be significantly better on doctrinal and moral fronts than Francis as well:

Adopting such a position requires us to presume, of course, that the blame for the removal of the abrupt and treacherous removal of Bishop Strickland doesn’t rest on Prevost, but various theories as to how the Vatican was run during Pope Francis’s autocractic pontificate might remove some of the responsibility and allow us to see Prevost as having been more faithful and traditional all along:

With Cardinal Burke, unlike with Dolan, we have no direct proof of these rumors, only a thanksgiving to God and a call, rightfully so, for our prayers for the new pontiff.

We will of course, see whether Leo XIV is psy-op or substance through what he does, but perhaps Leo XIV is providentially really the mean of all the cardinals in terms of his positions, and his selection is a way to bring about, at the very least, a temporary peace to the Church. That’s how Michael Matt of The Remnant, for example, sees Prevost:

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost has been described as a balanced figure in the current debate about the future of the Church, particularly regarding the Latin Mass. He is seen as a potential bridge between Pope Francis's inclusive agenda and more conservative elements within the Church. While he has not explicitly taken a stance on the Latin Mass, his supporters highlight his ability to listen and synthesize diverse perspectives, suggesting he might find a way to reconcile different viewpoints on the matter.

Or as Dr. Kwasniewski puts it, at the very least, Prevost had to have presented himself, or have been presented by cardinals of various camps, as a reconciler:

I don’t know how true this brief assessment is, but I’m convinced that many cardinals had to be convinced of it; they would not have voted for a candidate who struck them as simply progressive, with no capacity at all to reconcile factions. The need to address painful divisions in the Church was a topic of some importance in the general congregations, and the cardinals’ choice presumably reflects that motivation.⁶

There are hilariously ironic takes galore as well on Prevost as the apparent unifier he seems to have been as far as votes are concerned:

At the very least, as to positives, we don’t have the German bishops immediately going into schism or a Francis 2.0 like Cardinal Tagle excommunicating everyone of a traditional persuasion. The Church, for now, broken, beaten down, infected, and wounded, at least stays together.

The Battle

But if we were being honest with ourselves, as

Kennedy Hall

reminded us a few days ago, we were always going to have a battle after this conclave, one way or another.

We thought we’d either be immediately at war with the Pope if another in the vein of Francis were to be elected.

Or we thought we’d be at war with the world with a strong pontiff immediately—and clearly—on our side.

We’ll face one of these two wars soon enough. The Body of Christ is always at war, either with the evils of the world and the strategems without the Church, or with bad prelates or bad members of that body within.

What we didn’t expect, however, is that because of the particular choice of Prevost, the first battle is over the soul of Pope Leo XIV.

We are all, to some degree or another, claiming him as “our” Pope.

But none of us knows for sure which “side” he will be on. The background, beliefs, and friends of Prevost tell us he will be a liberal. The first few days tell us he could be more on the side of tradition and of Christ. Our fears tell us to expect the first and the worst, the rumors and our hopes the latter.

The battle is a spiritual one, of course, and we pray that God gives his vicar special grace, as Cardinal Burke prayed for Pope Leo XIV to have “abundant wisdom, strength, and courage to do all that Our Lord is asking of Him in these tumultuous times.” Pope Leo XIV, of course, is free to cooperate and not to cooperate with the help of the Holy Spirit.

But the battle is also a political and psychological one. We must publically pressure Pope Leo XIV, charitably and humbly, in the manner set forth for us by the example of St. Catherine of Sienna, to do what he is called to do, to live up to all the Popes who took the name Leo before him and defend the Church’s teachings and its tradition. This means giving him a chance, fairly, not pope-splaining, but praising whatever good he does unless circumstances “red-pill” us on his pontificate as much as they did ultimately about Francis.

The difference this time, as opposed to twelve years ago, is that we’re on our guard. Let’s just be careful not to overdo it.

Saint Catherine of Sienna, the Pope, and the Cardinals

Pope Leo XIV has praised synodality in his first few addresses. Let’s hope that the synodality he chooses to spread is the participation of the faithful in the Church of those like St. Catherine. In her respectful critiques of the Popes of her day, filled yet as they were with deep paternal affection and charity, she certainly did some great politicking and synodality in her time!

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale (1872-1945), St. Catherine of Siena (1919), illustration in “Golden Book of Famous Women”, p 239

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P.S. No time to get into it now, but

Austin’s Substack

(Austin Padgett) gives us some interesting political context of what Leo XIV could bring about in the world in light of the last Leo XIII:

1. https://www.complicitclergy.com/2025/05/08/a-chance-encounter-with-fr-martin-and-austen-ivereigh-reveals-their-papal-candidate/

Pretty concerning paragraph about James Martin and Austen Ivereigh, “two of the most enthusiastic supporters of Pope Francis’ pontificate and tireless defenders of the synodal, inclusive, and dialogue-oriented approach:

Austen Ivereigh, on the other hand, did speak to us… though perhaps he wishes he hadn’t. Visibly upset — and increasingly so as the conversation went on — he stood up, came over to us, and strongly reproached us for the “campaign” he believes we’re running against Cardinal Robert Prevost. “Very interesting campaign you’re running against Prevost,” he said, with a tone mixed with anger and frustration.

When we replied, “No, not against Prevost; against the culture of cover-up in the Church — are you now in favor of that?”, the discomfort was palpable. Nervously, Ivereigh referenced the Sodalitium as the supposed origin of our information. When we explained that there are many cases, all documented, he sarcastically insisted that InfoVaticana “always has more,” referring to the documents we’ve been publishing on the matter. His reaction left no doubt: Prevost was their man, the candidate in whom they had placed all their hopes.

2. Why didn't anyone predict the American pope?

3. https://www.ilgiornale.it/news/politica/parolin-e-litalia-i-grandi-delusi-rimasto-senza-voti-africa-2476395.html (Google Translated… I don’t know Italian!)

4. I’m presuming this is generally accurate, and have no proof that it is, but this chart generally matches others that I’ve seen.

5. According to Anthony of Avoiding Babylon, Dolan isn’t a traditionalist, but perhaps is a moderate ally: https://x.com/Catholicizm1/status/1880261321586807192

6. Of course, Dr. Kwasniewski has already come out with a magisterial treatment of his hopes and concerns regarding our new pontiff that you should all read below:

SPECIAL: My Hopes, My Fears, and My Prayers for Leo XIV