{"id":37056,"date":"2025-05-14T12:57:07","date_gmt":"2025-05-14T12:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/christianpure.com\/learn\/pope-leo-xivs-american-citizenship-can-he-keep-it-as-pope\/"},"modified":"2025-05-14T12:57:07","modified_gmt":"2025-05-14T12:57:07","slug":"pope-leo-xivs-american-citizenship-can-he-keep-it-as-pope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianpure.com\/nl\/learn\/pope-leo-xivs-american-citizenship-can-he-keep-it-as-pope\/","title":{"rendered":"Pope Leo XIV\u2019s American citizenship: Can he keep it as pope?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n Pope Leo XIV speaks to the College of Cardinals in Rome on Saturday, May 10, 2025. \/ Credit: Vatican Media<\/span>\n<\/div>\n

CNA Staff, May 14, 2025 \/ 06:00 am (CNA).<\/p>\n

Catholics around the world continue to celebrate the election last week of Pope Leo XIV, the first pope from the United States. In addition to being a natural-born American citizen, Leo is also a naturalized citizen of Peru, having ministered there for decades. <\/p>\n

His election as pope raises several interesting questions from a nationality law perspective. Chiefly: can a U.S. citizen become king of a foreign country and still remain an American citizen? <\/p>\n

The pope is, after all, an absolute monarch; he possesses, as the Vatican\u2019s Fundamental Law explains,<\/a> \u201cthe fullness of the power of government, which includes the legislative, executive, and judicial powers\u201d of the Vatican City State \u2014 a sovereign country that maintains relations with over 175 other nations \u2014 and the Holy See, which is the central governing authority of the Church. <\/p>\n

Paul Hunker, an American immigration attorney and a Catholic, told CNA that U.S. federal law \u2014 specifically 8 U.S. Code \u00a7 1481<\/a> \u2014 spells out some very specific conditions under which a U.S. citizen can lose his or her citizenship.<\/p>\n

These can include committing an act of treason, obtaining naturalization in a foreign state, and, crucially, accepting a position as a foreign head of state.<\/a> The key, though, is that in order to be \u201cexpatriating,\u201d these things must be done by a person voluntarily and with the intention of relinquishing their U.S. nationality.<\/p>\n

Het Amerikaanse ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken zegt<\/a> gaat er in het algemeen van uit dat Amerikaanse staatsburgers, zelfs als ze een buitenlandse regeringspost aanvaarden, hun staatsburgerschap willen behouden, tenzij anders \u201cduidelijk en geloofwaardig\u201d is vastgesteld. <\/p>\n

Hunker said in the pope\u2019s case, Leo would likely need to affirm an intention to renounce his citizenship directly to a consular officer at the U.S. embassy in Rome \u2014 something Leo has not signaled any intention to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think unless he comes forward and says, \u2018I have the intention of relinquishing my U.S. nationality,\u2019 then he is not considered to have lost his U.S. citizenship,\u201d Hunker said. <\/p>\n

\u201cAt a deep level, I think it says something great about our country: When you\u2019re born here, the government can\u2019t kick you out \u2014 unless you affirmatively say that you\u2019re renouncing your citizenship.\u201d <\/p>\n

However, the State Department does go on to say that it may \u201cactively review cases in which a U.S. national is elected or otherwise appointed to serve as a foreign head of state, foreign head of government, or foreign minister,\u201d as such cases \u201craise complex questions of international law, including issues related to the level of immunity from U.S. jurisdiction that the person so serving may be afforded.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whatever ultimately transpires regarding Leo\u2019s U.S. citizenship, Pope Leo will potentially have to continue filing a tax return with the IRS<\/a> as an American citizen living abroad \u2014 another potentially complex oddity that is uncharted territory since Poland, Germany, and Argentina, the homelands of the last three popes, don\u2019t tax their citizens abroad. It might require a private letter from the IRS or a specific law from Congress addressing Leo\u2019s situation, the Washington Post meldde AsiaNews.<\/a><\/p>\n

But what about Leo\u2019s Peruvian citizenship? Under the Peruvian Constitution,<\/a> Peruvian nationality \u2014 even if obtained through naturalization \u2014 is not lost except by express renunciation before a Peruvian authority. Thus, the status of Leo\u2019s Peruvian citizenship is similar to that of his U.S. citizenship: He\u2019ll likely keep it unless he specifically chooses to renounce it. <\/p>\n

So now that he\u2019s the pope, does Leo also have Vatican citizenship? Yes and no. <\/p>\n

Andrea Gagliarducci, a Vatican analyst for CNA, said Leo would already have had a Vatican passport, as every cardinal and curial official is given one as part of their office; possessing the passport gives them what is known as \u201cfunctional citizenship.\u201d <\/p>\n

However, Gagliarducci noted that under canon law,<\/a> it\u2019s not really accurate to say that the pope is a \u201ccitizen\u201d of the Holy See, because the Holy See and the pope are one and the same. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe pope is not [a] citizen, he is the whole Holy See,\u201d Gagliarducci explained. \u201cThe pope does not need a passport nor a citizenship, because he is the source of every citizenship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Given Leo\u2019s broad new temporal powers as pope, there would appear to be no reason he couldn\u2019t maintain his other citizenships if he wanted to \u2014 there\u2019s even precedent for this, as in 2014 Pope Francis renewed his Argentinian passport<\/a>, though Francis never returned there during his 12-year pontificate. <\/p>\n

For his part, Gagliarducci said Francis\u2019 maintenance of his Argentinian citizenship was simply \u201cnot necessary.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, there is no harm in keeping the passports, but they are no longer needed and useful. The Vatican gives you a passport and lets you retain all of your citizenship along with that passport,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201c[But] you cannot consider the pope a Peruvian, a U.S. citizen, or whatever. He is the Holy See. This is different; it is another world.\u201d<\/p>\n

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[ad_1] Pope Leo XIV speaks to the College of Cardinals in Rome on Saturday, May 10, 2025. \/ Credit: Vatican Media CNA Staff, May 14, 2025 \/ 06:00 am (CNA). Catholics around the world continue to celebrate the election last week of Pope Leo XIV, the first pope from the United States. In addition to [\u2026]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37058,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[100],"tags":[],"series":[],"class_list":["post-37056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-christian-news"],"mb":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/christianpure.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/1747227432_whatsapp-image-2025-05-10-at-09.53.37.jpeg?fit=1600%2C1066&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":58153,"url":"https:\/\/christianpure.com\/nl\/learn\/federal-bill-would-exempt-pope-from-u-s-taxes-safeguard-his-american-citizenship\/","url_meta":{"origin":37056,"position":0},"title":"Federal bill would exempt pope from U.S. taxes, \u2018safeguard\u2019 his American citizenship","author":"Christian Pure Team","date":"augustus 17, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Pope Leo XIV waves as the popemobile passes by a crowd of American pilgrims gathered in St. Peter\u2019s Square for the pope\u2019s general audience on June 18, 2025, at the Vatican. \/ Credit: Vatican Media CNA Staff, Jul 24, 2025 \/ 12:35 pm (CNA). 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