It’s only been a day since white smoke puffed out of the Sistine Chapel and already the Wikipedia article of the new pope, Leo XIV, is a cauldron of woke backbiting, much of it centered on the most historically notable point related to the Bishop of Rome: he’s American.

Given that Pope Leo is the first American to hold the role, this fact — confirmed by numerous news outlets on Wikipedia’s list of reliable sources — would presumably be featured prominently on Leo’s entry. (Read my Pirate Wires investigation into how Wikipedia gamed the reliable sources lists here.)

In reality, Wikipedia has not just downplayed Pope Leo’s American nationality but ensnared it in a debate about what an American is, if Leo really is an American, and the racial status of his ancestry, including (of course) the extent to which his forebears were black.

Despite being born in Chicago, Pope Leo is characterized by Wikipedia as the first “pope from the United States or from Peru.” That’s a strange articulation of a historical first, especially coming from a site that features articles on the first African American mayors, first African American U.S. legislators, first openly LGBTQ politicians in the US, list of LGBTQ firsts by year (2010s), and list of first women holders of political office in the US.

The Talk Page on Leo’s article is awash in debate about the meaning of the term “American,” which is likely what led to the equivocation in the article’s text. A number of editors argued that Leo is not the first American pope at all: Francis was. One editor inveighed, “Should not say he’s the first ‘American’ pope. That’s not correct. The prior pope was also American.” Numerous other editors argued the same point. “Pope Leo XIV is the second Pope born in the Americas,” wrote Alimsts, who also made a less nuanced epistemological argument: “Just refer to USA as USA and America as America. USA is not the whole of America.”

But all of this developed amid a broader argument about whether Leo, who was naturalized in Peru, is really Peruvian. An editor argued that Leo should be described as American-Peruvian. Another responded that’s incorrect — he’s actually Peruvian-American. One editor commented only, “AcKsHuAlLy.”

A sharp-eyed editor argued that trying to claim Leo is Peruvian is specious. “An American who moved to Africa to minister would never be referred to as the first ‘African pope’ no matter what the preface.” Others backed up this idea, with one writing, “Should he really be described as ‘American and Peruvian’? None of his grandparents of Peruvian [sic]. He only has dual citizenship because he moved there. He is 100% American.”

Another editor remarked that the problem has nothing to do with the Wikipedia article, per se, but with Americans. IP address 195.77.20.5 thundered, “Just stop calling youselves [sic] Americans excluding the rest of the continent!”One editor, Talmidge, argued that, at heart, the issue lies in the fact that the demonym “American” is perilously open-ended: “This is an argument that can’t be won, because the adjective American is ambiguous.” In another thread, editors argued that Leo is as Peruvian as he is American. “He’s as much an American Pope as he’s a Peruvian Pope,” another IP address claimed.

In multiple threads, editors argued over whether Leo’s ancestors were black, Haitian, Creole or some other formulation. Justfixingit wrote that the “current Wikipedia entry [on Leo] states that Pope Robert Francis Prevost has ‘Afro-Haitian’ ancestry. However, extensive genealogical and primary source records show that his maternal lineage is Louisiana Creole.”

Other contributors disagreed. After doing their own “genealogical research,” Le Petit Paris LA found that one of Leo’s ancestors was “mulatto.” IP address 2A02:ED04:3581:2:0:0:0:D001 retorted that this would make Leo “Black” (their capital B, not mine) per the One Drop Rule, an idea Le Petit Paris rejected as “degrading Afro Americans in the Antebellum Southern United States.”

It is not “degrading to be considered Black,” the IP address shot back before discoursing on the idea that Leo is a “classic American story” of a man whose “ancestors were Black at some point…and successfully passed as White to avoid racism.” A different IP address concluded, with gratuitous capitalization, that “The Pope is Black,” before immediately reversing course to assert, sensibly, “I think it’s more useful to consider him Catholic.”

This would have been a fine place to leave off. But Le Petit Paris would not let the matter drop. Instead, LPP argued that calling Leo black, or Black, in the article would “be a bold statement bringing pride to African Americans” and other countries whose populations are significantly “Negroid.”

“O.M.O.” LPP wrote. One man’s opinion.

—Ashley Rindsberg