Pope Leo XIV makes waves with his fashion options

When Pope Leo XIV went out to the central loggia of the Basilica of Saint Peter to greet the crowd for the first time after his election of May 8, liturgical fashion fans worldwide took note: Gone was the simple white drawer and the silver cross favored by Pope Francis. Behind it was the Satin Red Satin’s shoulder layer, the Burgundy Stola with gold embroidery and a gold cross that had a double -chain silk cord.

During the first weeks of Leo, the illusion grew among liturgical Catholics conscious of fashion as they observed new additions to the wardrobe, or rather a return to the old additions of the papal closet: dagger, white pants, fit.

Following Francis’ revolutionary papacy, Vatican watchmen now wonders if Leo’s return to past Sartorial Gaze means a return to the past, including major politics issues. But for the tailor of the liturgical tailoring shops in Rome, there is hope that Leo’s return to the fantasy popper spam will be a business advantage if the traditional appearance of Leo will have a small effect from the pope to the priests and everyone in the middle.

Style is a return to the form

According to Reverell John Wauck, a Church Communication Professor at the Pontifical Holy Cross University in Rome, Leo’s clothing options are a “ return to form ”, and his dress similar to what Pope Benedict XVI, Pope John Paul II, and other popes returned to the Middle Ages.

They show “a respect for tradition,” he said.

This respect for the papal office is important for many conservative Catholics. Many conservatives and traditionalists were in the informal style of Francis and the contempt of tradition, which reached his pinnacle with his repression in the old Latin Mass. The old liturgy was held before the modernizing reforms of the Vatican Council modernizing the second Vatican Council; Francis greatly restricted access to the old liturgy, saying that it had become a source of division in the parishes.

Leo has shown a strong familiarity with Latin and took Sunday to sing Sunday’s prayer not in Latin. Some traditional Catholics expect Leo to take the pro-Latin path even more and reverses Francis to allow greater use of traditional Latin mass.

Massimo Faggioli, professor of theology at Villanova University, where Leo went to college, said that it is too early to know if Leo will reverse the reform of Francis.

“It remains to see if Leo’s most traditional dress and liturgical style means that he will change the strong decisions of Francis that limit the so -called” Latin Mass, “he said.

That said, Faggioli said that North conservatives -Americans look especially happy with Leo’s traditional dress, given Francis’s contempt for papacy fashion.

“In that sense, Francis could have been a parenthesis or interlude, more than a change in the tradition in” papal style “, he said in an email.

Leo has also made other changes

At his inaugural mass on May 18, 2025, Pope Leo XIV spread his arm to sprinkle Holy Water and revealed a shirt with daggers, which Francis had greatly avoided. He also wore an amitto, and an albus kept in his place by a cliff. For non -experts, Amitto is a string linen that is placed around the neck, the Alb is the white robe that is wearing under ceremonial clothing, and the cliff is a braided rope with tassels that serves as a belt.

If it were not for the long lenses of photographers trained in a relentless manner to all the pope’s gestures, the Leo change from the standard black pants of Francis to more traditional white papal pants would have been completely unnoticed.

In addition to clothing changes, Leo has returned to some other Vatican traditions that Francis missed.

He has been willing to accept the traditional “baciamano” or kiss his ring. Francis liked to have kissed the ring and often turned his hand away if anyone was trying to kiss.

“I think what we see with Pope Leo is the desire to embrace tradition, even if it risks to seem perhaps more formal than Pope Francis,” said Wauck. The idea is that “seeing this tradition as a treasure that is preserved and embraced as opposed to something that makes one feel a little unpleasant.”

It remains to see if Leo will move to the papal apartment of the apostolic palace, which was empty during the 12 years of Francis Papacy. Francis shocked the world by choosing to live in a small room in the residence of Santa Marta in the Vatican, eating his meals in the common dining room.

For the Reverenda Castro Prudencio, all this is very important. “For Pope Francis it was a simplicity. Always. And Pope Leo has assumed what Pope Benedict had and many others. It’s what the Church is like,” he said.