One hundred days as Pope
That is how long it has been since the beginning of Prevost's pontificate, which began under the banner of spirituality, verticality, normalization, and reconciliation. To the relief of some and the disappointment of others (which is also a good sign).
Today, August 16, 2025, marks the fateful first “hundred days” of the pontificate of Robert Francis Prevost, elected Pope under the name Leo XIV on May 8 (a day entrusted to the dual protection of Our Lady of Pompeii and the Archangel Michael). Despite the round number and symbolic significance, the time that has passed since then is a minimal portion of a pontificate, which is destined to last much longer than any government on average. If this was true for Prevost's two predecessors, even though they were elected at an advanced age, it is even more true for Leo, who is not yet 70 and is likely to have a much longer pontificate, compared to which the first hundred days that have just passed are only the introit antiphon. A few “verses,” but not insignificant ones, to get an idea of what is to come.
Spirituality, verticality, normalization, and reconciliation: these are the four words that summarize the Leonine antiphon, ever since it first appeared on the loggia of St. Peter's. The spirituality in question, of course, is that of Augustine, which the Pope rightly never misses an opportunity to dispense in “pills.” But from the beginning, it manifested itself above all in the return of “verticality,” as Stefano Fontana, among others, observed. As soon as he was elected, the Provost began with a liturgical greeting, “peace be with you,” the words of the risen Christ, not exactly a casual “good evening.” The next day, celebrating in the Sistine Chapel, he again brought a breath of “verticality” with that “disappear so that Christ may remain.” And so it was: he literally disappeared until the next day's impromptu visit to Genazzano, a Marian shrine dear to the Augustinians, leaving the hunters of anecdotes of the “Pope next door” series high and dry.
Even in his “impromptu” appearances, Leo XIV maintains a sense of proportion and spiritual depth. Not only in Genazzano. Consider his recent visit to the young patient at the Bambino Gesù hospital: few words were leaked, and those that were were extremely edifying, both from the Pope and from the patient's family. For the sake of our country, we would gladly avoid comparing this visit with that of his predecessor to the ailing [Italian abortion champion Emma] Bonino, but it is a necessary comparison in order to take the pulse of the situation and ask ourselves whether, at least in part, the atmosphere has changed.
This is the little we know, but it is enough to formulate some hypotheses about the much we still do not know. To avoid misunderstandings and at the risk of sounding obvious: Prevost is not Bergoglio and, of course, he is not the anti-Bergoglio either. At the same time, Leo XIV seems inclined to take up some issues dear to Francis, from the ecological question to migrants to synodality. But the antiphon at least suggests (and gives us hope!) that he could also “recalculate” them, like a navigator, in a more Christocentric direction, without turning them into mantras and repositioning them in a different light from the predominantly socio-political, not to say ideological, one that increasingly characterized his predecessor's pontificate.
It is also likely that he will proceed with carefully considered decisions for key appointments, rather than necessarily immediate ones. So much so that after three months there is still no successor to him in the key role of prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops. And that he will favor reflection over polarization on the “hot” issues that are rocking Peter's boat, such as the open wound caused by Traditionis Custodes: it is difficult to imagine that Leone would want to twist the knife in the wound by shouting “down with the reactionary!” The China dossier and the ongoing synodal “construction site” in Germany are more complicated issues, on which it seems premature to press him and ask him, to paraphrase Jacopone da Todi: “What will you do, Pope Leone? You have come to the comparison.”
