America’s first-ever pope has irritated some soccer supporters back home after sharing which team he plans to get behind when the FIFA World Cup begins next month.
Pope Leo XIV will not be rooting for the United States during the tournament, based on comments he made about his sporting loyalties. Instead, the 70-year-old pontiff says his support will go to another nation from the Americas.
In an interview with Crux Now Media, the Chicago-born pope was asked who he’d back in a hypothetical head-to-head between Peru and America. He replied he’d ‘probably’ support Peru.
That answer quickly set off a backlash online, with some furious fans calling him a ‘fake American’ and even a ‘traitor’. Many of those criticizing him appeared not to understand the personal history behind his attachment to Peru.
Some users questioned his ties to his birthplace, posting on X, ‘What part of Peru is Chicago in??’ Others went further, joking that his ‘Chicago card is revoked’.
However, the pope’s connection to Peru runs deep. He has spent nearly as many years serving and preaching there as he has living in Illinois.
Before becoming Pope Leo XIV, he was known as Robert Prevost. After completing a doctorate in Catholic doctrine following studies in Rome in the early 1980s, he moved to Peru in 1985 to join a mission—an assignment that shaped the next 15 years of his life.
That long period of ministry helped make him a well-liked figure in heavily Catholic Peru, a country where soccer is a major passion. Peru’s national team even marked his election with the message: ‘New leader in hope…and he is Peruvian at heart.’
Even so, his Peruvian allegiances appear to be limited to soccer.
When it comes to American sports, he remains closely tied to Chicago: he supports the White Sox in baseball, and he’s also associated with the Bulls and Bears in basketball and football.
Given how central soccer is in Lima compared with Chicago’s South Side, it’s unsurprising that he’s developed a soft spot for the team many of his former parishioners follow most intensely.
Not everyone saw his comments as disloyal. One person argued his stance was entirely predictable: “Soccer in Peru is by far the biggest sport, in America they don’t care about it. Makes complete sense.”
After his public comments on international affairs—particularly his interventions against the war in Iran—some MAGA influencers also accused him of ‘hating America’. Others pushed back, including Catholics who defended him: “Pope Leo XIV doesn’t hate the USA, and isn’t against it,” one wrote.
“When you become a Pope you don’t have your nationality anymore, you belong to the Vatican, to the Church. Doesn’t matter anymore where he was born.”