As the leader of Vatican City, he is the head of a sovereign nation. But maintaining dual citizenship as a foreign head of state can “raise complex questions of international law,” according to the State Department.

The white smoke that billowed from the Sistine Chapel on Thursday signalled the selection of a new pope — the first from America. Thousands of miles away in Illinois, a sense of ecstasy greeted the man previously known as Robert Prevost,

Pope Leo XIV, the first American-born pontiff, was elected May 8. His selection came as a surprise to some church leaders, though not an unwelcome one.