They remembered him in rubber boots, in a devastating flood, working side by side with the Red Cross. They shared images of him on a horse, in the countryside, wearing stylish aviator shades and crooning Christmas ballads — “Feliz Navidad!” — grinning and clapping alongside a rousing crowd.

Pope Leo XIV may have been born in Chicago, but the people of Chiclayo, a city in northern Peru where he served as bishop from 2015 to 2023, have claimed him as one of their own.

“Welcome to Chiclayo, the land of the pope!” a flight attendant announced as a plane from Lima touched down on Thursday. Passengers burst into applause.

Pope Leo XIV spent much of his career outside the United States, arriving in northern Peru in 1985 at a time when internal conflict terrorized much of the countryside, killing many Peruvians and making the country an uncommon destination for foreigners.

He stayed, except for a brief stint in Illinois, until roughly 1999, according to an official biography. And then he returned again in 2014, becoming bishop of Chiclayo in 2015.