From a kindergartner named Leo to pastors and faithful at churches, McHenry County-area Catholic react with excitement to the new pope - and his Chicago ties.

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, 69, is a member of the Augustinian religious order, a missionary and lived at the friary on the campus of Providence Catholic High School in New Lenox for one year in the 1980s

The new pope, formerly Robert Prevost and now Pope Leo XIV, is the youngest of three boys raised by a school superintendent father and school librarian mother in south suburban Dolton

Pope Leo XIV ‘s choice of name signals a commitment to social justice which is in line with the late Pope Francis' global ministry

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Robert Prevost has been elected the first pope from the United States in the history of the Catholic Church. The Chicago-born missionary took the name Leo XIV.

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