The "Lion of Hope" returns to his homeland

Pope Leo XIV, Lima East Tower. Good afternoon, welcome home. Runway authorized for landing," announced this Wednesday the air traffic controller chosen for a historic occasion: the last stage of the first trip to the Americas of the Supreme Pontiff, who also stole his heart decades ago.

The young woman asked permission to dedicate a few words to him on behalf of her compatriots. She did it with a lump in her throat, but full of composure: "Holy Father, from the Control Tower, Peru rises today to receive you. We Peruvians are expectant for what God will do through them, for the words that can touch many hearts. May your visit strengthen our faith and encourage us to live a little more like Jesus. Welcome home, papa and papa."

And that was only the beginning of a tide of joy and admiration for a radiant man, often moved, with an overflowing countenance, who dedicated his first greeting through social networks: "Good night, Peru! Let's open our hearts!" Words that came "late": Peru has opened wide the doors of its heart to receive him.

Robert Prevost left for Rome at the beginning of 2023, called to the ranks of the Dicastery by Francis. The bishop of Chiclayo, more Peruvian than American, did not want to leave the people to whom he dedicated so many years: the Andean country was living under the upheaval of the fall of the Marxist president Pedro Castillo and the massacre in the Andes in the subsequent protests, which ended the lives of fifty Peruvians. A boiler that threatened to explode.

His predecessor had a surprise in store for him: he was one of his favorites to succeed him, but first he had to pass the course of directing the internal government of the Church.

Prevost returns to Peru as Leo XIV and one of the few voices on the planet that rises above the extremes and fashionable populisms. "The Lion of Hope", as the children of the children's choir called him, who so moved the prelate at the doors of the Casa de Pizarro, one of the highest points on the historic Wednesday of Lima, which received him in a massive way and which Prevost returned with constant winks to whom he dedicated so many years.

The one that Peruvians will never forget occurred with President Keiko Fujimori at his side. The dictator's daughter raised her hand to her chest to sing the national anthem and Leo XIV took the opportunity to sing it, because he feels it is his. In young countries like Peru, the anthem is one of the main symbols of sovereignty and identity. No jokes with him.

Leo It was precisely in the northern city where nine years ago the bishop publicly criticized the human rights violations committed during the Fujimori dictatorship.

More than half an hour in the Government Palace with Keiko, increasingly close in an overwhelmed country. Callao and Lima took to their streets.

"He was not looking for honors or positions, the young missionary came to serve. Soon he stopped being a foreigner... Walking on foot without luxury, blessing everyone. This is how you learned to love Peru and Peru to love you. With its message of hope and peace," Keiko recalled at the nightly meeting with civil society.

Fujimori recalled the special conditions of Prevost's tour, with the great threat of the moment, the El Niño weather phenomenon. And he did not forget national reconciliation, another of the great challenges of Peruvians. "I ask you, Holy Father, to collect the message of pride of millions of Peruvians, that healing and reconciliation be the great miracle of your coming," the president stressed.

In his first speech on Peruvian soil, Prevost recognized the specialness of the moment: "For years I shared the lives of its people, I learned from their faith, they shared their table with me, a good ceviche. And they made me feel like one of their own. How much of my own story belongs to you too. "I return as successor of Peter, called to serve the Church."

"I am also returning to my homeland," insisted the pope, who linked the birth of faith in these lands with their original communities. "To love a people is to want everyone to live with dignity in it, a feeling that I have come to understand better thanks to you," said Leo XIV, who warned about the forgetfulness of the powerful in a country that has imprisoned four of its most recent presidents, all of them for corruption.

The echo of a word, honesty, with the soft forcefulness with which the pontiff pronounces it, remained floating in the air after the pope closed his speech.