Yes, the new Pope has visited Ireland - will he return?

Robert Francis Prevost, the Cardinal from Chicago who became Pope Leo XIV on Thursday, May 8, has visited Ireland a number of times.

In June 2005, Prevost, then the Prior General of the Augustinian Order, was in Fethard, Co Tipperary, to attend a special Chapter Mass in Fethard Abbey, which was celebrating 700 years.

"This visit was organised long before our prior, Fr Gerry Horan, was chosen to be Provincial of the Irish Province," the local publication Fethard News reported at the time.

"As one of the first acts at the new Chapter, Rev. Fr Prevost will confirm Fr. Gerry as the next Provincial, on 27th June."

Joe Kenny of Fethard News took to social media on Thursday to share a 2005 photo of the future Pope alongside John Meagher OSA and the newly appointed Provincial Fr. Gerry Horan OSA at Fethard Abbey:

Also on Thursday, Jasper McCarthy, the proprietor of pub and restaurant McCarthy's of Fethard, also took to social media to share that he had met the now Pope.

"This is something that I never thought I would say," he wrote on the pub's Facebook page, "I met the Pope. In McCarthy’s."

McCarthy said he recalls being introduced to Prevost by Fr Gerry when they were in for lunch one day.

"So when I heard that a former head of the Augustinian Order was made Pope today, I rang Fr Gerry to see if it was the same man.

"It was."

Meanwhile, Fr Iggy O'Donovan, an Irish priest based in Dublin, told RTÉ News on Thursday that he met Prevost while studying for the priesthood in Rome and that they are both members of the Order of Saint Augustine.

"He has been to Ireland several times, certainly at Augustinian gatherings and chapters and so forth," Fr O'Donovan told RTÉ News.

"I have a distinct memory of him visiting my native Tipperary in Fethard," the priest said, adding, "He's been to Ireland. He would know Ireland very, very well, and the Irish Augustinian province very, very well."

But it's not just Tipperary that can claim a connection to the new Pope.

Indeed, EchoLive reported on Friday that Pope Leo XIV spent time in Co Cork on a visit to friend and Irish priest Fr Tony Finn in 2007.

Prevost was photographed at the time on the altar of St Augustin's Church in Cork alongside his fellow Augustinians Fr Jerry Horan, Fr Pat Moran, and Fr Michael Brennock to honour Peg Bolton and Marie Finn for 50 years of service of signing in the choir.

“He loved Ireland. He loved the people," Fr Finn, who is now based in Co Galway, told the Irish Examiner.

Fr Finn believes Pope Leo XIV "will come to Ireland."

“I know that he will come to Ireland at the first opportunity," Fr Finn said, "I'd say less [than five years].

“I don't know when, but he'll certainly come. He will go to the US, to Africa, and Peru.”