Newsmax Rome correspondent Alex Salvi told “Finnerty” on Thursday night that Pope Leo XIV could be a unifier of the Catholic Church given that he has progressive and traditional leanings.

Salvi told guest host Ed Henry that several names emerged as contenders to replace Pope Francis, who died April 21. But it wasn’t until recently that Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, 69, who took the name Pope Leo XIV following his election Thursday, and Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, emerged as the strongest contenders because they were viewed as unifiers.

“Both of those men in many ways share some similarities,” Salvi said. “They’re both relatively young. Pizzaballa, 60 years old. Prevost, 69 years old. They both are very relatively silent, I’ll say, when it comes to some of the more controversial issues that took place within the Catholic Church. So, because of that, neither one of them had a reputation one way or the other, too far left, too far right or anything like that. And that may have been the difference-maker when it became Prevost surfacing as the new leader of the Catholic Church.

Read more at Newsmax© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.