Omagh man to publish one of first books about new Pope

ONE of the first books written about the newly elected Pope Leo XIV – and the first to be published in English – has been penned by Strathroy native, Michael Kelly.

Titled ‘In Christ We Are One – Pope Leo XIV at the Service of Humanity’, the book will be officially launched at a special event in the Cappagh Parish Centre, Killyclogher, this Friday evening, July 4, at 7pm.

Priced at £6.99, all proceeds from the publication will go to Aid to the Church in Need, a Vatican-based charity.

Speaking ahead of the launch, Mr Kelly, a respected journalist and commentator on Church affairs, said he was approached to write the book ‘precisely because so many people had not heard of Cardinal Robert Prevost ahead of his election as Pope Leo’.

“After Pope Francis died, there was endless speculation about his successor. Very few people considered Cardinal Prevost because he was an American, and the conventional wisdom was that the cardinals would not elect a US Churchman to be the 267th Pope,” Mr Kelly explained.

Publishers commissioned the book shortly after the election, requesting a user-friendly introduction to the new pontiff, focusing on his life, missionary work, and early signs of his leadership direction.

The book traces Leo XIV’s journey from his modest beginnings in a working-class suburb of Chicago to the global stage as head of the Catholic Church.

“Leo sees the power of the Gospel and the papacy to build bridges – pontiff comes from the Latin for bridge – and in a world dominated by hate and division, that is a powerful antidote,” Mr Kelly said. “Whatever our faith, we should all wish him a fair wind.”