At Rate Field, the home of the Chicago White Sox, some 30,000 celebrated a native son, Pope Leo XIV, Saturday afternoon at a mass organized by the Archdiocese of Chicago. Leo appeared via video from Rome, in a prerecorded message encouraging young people to engage in the community of the church.
The mass, announced in May, was open to anyone with a ticket, which went on sale May 30 for $5 each on Ticketmaster. The first 10,000 tickets sold out in 15 minutes. Bishop Lawrence Sullivan, vicar general of the archdiocese, told Chicago’s WGN9 that the cost was set at $5 to “defray the cost and make sure that everybody can come.”
On the way into the stadium, attendees had the opportunity to grab Pope Leo XIV souvenirs and T-shirts, many—such as a “DAAA PRAYERS” shirt—riffing on a Chicago accent as it was rendered in a long-ago Saturday Night Live sketch. Cutouts of Leo could be found throughout Rate Field for people to pose for photos with. People also waited in line for first mass certificates that read “My First Mass at the Ballpark.”
