The world’s Catholics have a new leader. He’s Argentinian Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires.
He’s a 76-year-old Jesuit. He will be Pope Francis 1.
White smoke billowed from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel just after 6pm this evening, indicating that the cardinals gathered in the Vatican have elected a new pope.
Bells have also tolled in the Vatican City State.
The new pope takes over from Pope Benedict XVI who retired last month.
Pope Francis lives a poor life, rejecting the traditional trappings of a pope. He even used a public bus in his home city.
He is the first Latin American pope.
Pope Francis laughed as he said the cardinals went looking for a new pope “and it looks as if they went to the other side of the world to find him.”
He said he wanted to pray for Pope Benedict and said an ‘Our Father’ for his predecessor.
Calmly spoken, the new pope is revered in his native Argentina for his work with the poor.
In Donegal the bells of St Eunan’s Cathedral in Letterkenny rang out to celebrate the news of Pope Francis’s election.
It’s thought that he beat Cardinal Scola from Milan (pictured below) in the vote.
