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PODCAST

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope

Caloroga Shark Media

With white smoke clearing and history made, our coverage now follows Robert Francis Prevost—the first American ever elected pope—as he begins his reign as Pope Leo XIV.Our daily bulletins track this unprecedented pontificate from his first blessing to his installation mass, analyzing how this Chicago-born, Peru-naturalized former Vatican insider will lead 1.4 billion Catholics worldwide.What does his choice of the name "Leo" signal? How will his two decades in Latin America shape his global vision

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All Episodes

14:25

35. The Prisoner Pope

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/11/02

Napoleon personally arrests Pope Pius the Seventh and drags him into five years of captivity. The emperor who crowned himself demonstrates that papal spiritual claims provide no protection against military force when imperial ambitions are at stake.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players, visit caloroga.com/plus. No plug-ins

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14:35

34. The Counter Attack

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/10/26

The Catholic Church strikes back with the Council of Trent, militant Jesuit shock troops, and a brutal Inquisition. The Counter-Reformation saves papal Christianity from Protestant conquest but transforms the church into a centralized, authoritarian empire.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players, visit caloroga.com/plus. No plug-ins

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15:02

33. The Fire Spreads

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/10/19

Calvin transforms Geneva into a theocratic police state while Henry the Eighth breaks England away from Rome to solve his marriage problems. Protestant ideas explode across Europe like wildfire, consuming the religious unity that had defined medieval Christendom.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players, visit caloroga.com/plus. No

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14:42

32. Monks Revolt

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/10/12

Martin Luther's hammer blows against a church door in Wittenberg echo across Europe, shattering the Catholic monopoly on Christianity forever. The German monk's challenge to papal authority ignites the Protestant Reformation and splits Western Christianity permanently.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players, visit caloroga.com/plus

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11:45

31. The Borgias

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/10/05

Alexander the Sixth transforms the Vatican into a criminal enterprise run by his murderous children Cesare and Lucrezia. Orgies in the papal apartments, systematic poisoning of enemies, and the sale of church offices turn the throne of Saint Peter into the seat of a Renaissance crime family.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players,

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16:05

30. The Warrior Pope

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/09/28

Julius the Second trades his papal robes for armor and personally leads armies into battle. The pope who commissioned Michelangelo also commanded cannons, proving that Renaissance papal power meant wielding both sword and paintbrush in pursuit of territorial conquest and artistic glory.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players, visit

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14:53

29. The Iron Pope

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/09/21

In 955, eighteen-year-old Octavian became Pope John XII, the grandson of the notorious Marozia and the ultimate product of the corrupt Pornocracy system. Contemporary sources describe a pope who turned the Lateran Palace into a brothel, ordained bishops for money, and allegedly toasted the devil while gambling. This episode examines the most scandalous pope in history and the dramatic confrontation with Holy Roman Emperor Otto I that would finally break the cycle of corruption plaguing the

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14:32

28. The Pornocracy

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/09/14

The Cadaver Synod of 897, where Pope Stephen VI put his predecessor's rotting corpse on trial, marked the beginning of the most corrupt period in papal history. For the next sixty years, the papal office became a prize fought over by Roman aristocratic families through murder, seduction, and betrayal. This episode explores the era when powerful women like Theodora and Marozia used sex and violence to control the successors of Saint Peter, transforming spiritual leadership into hereditary political

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6:57

God’s Influencer Becomes a Saint, LGBTQ Pilgrims...

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/09/13

Carlo Acutis, the 15-year-old computer prodigy known as “God’s influencer,” has been canonized in Rome as the Catholic Church’s first millennial saint. Also, hundreds of LGBTQ Catholics joined a historic Jubilee pilgrimage through the Holy Door at St. Peter’s Basilica, marking a dramatic shift from decades past. And Pope Leo taps Chicago’s own Art Smith and Phil Stefani to launch a farm-to-table restaurant at the Papal Villas of Castel Gandolfo.Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga

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16:14

27. The Forged Donation

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/09/07

In 778, Pope Adrian I made a remarkable historical claim in a letter to Charlemagne, referencing how Emperor Constantine had granted the western Roman Empire to the papacy centuries earlier. What Adrian didn't mention was that this "Donation of Constantine" was a complete fabrication - one of history's most successful frauds. This episode explores how a forged medieval document became the legal foundation for papal territorial claims and shaped European politics for nearly 700 years, despite its

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19:07

26. The Price Of Power

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/31

When Charlemagne died in 814, Pope Leo III's great triumph in creating the papal-imperial alliance began to reveal unexpected costs. His successors discovered that the power to crown emperors came with corresponding vulnerability to imperial control. This episode examines how Leo's achievement created new dangers for future popes, as the alliance meant to protect papal independence instead created dependencies that would corrupt and constrain papal authority for generations.Unlock an ad-free podcast

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13:17

25. The Crown

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/24

The events of Christmas Day 800 transformed Pope Leo III's desperate alliance with Charlemagne into a formal new order that would define European civilization for the next millennium. When Leo suddenly placed a golden crown on Charlemagne's head during mass, the wounded pope who had fled Rome became the maker of emperors. This episode explores how Leo transformed his greatest vulnerability into unprecedented strength, creating political precedents that would endure for a thousand years.

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10:37

24. The Attack

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/17

On a crisp April morning in 799, Pope Leo III walked through the streets of Rome leading a religious procession when armed men suddenly burst from the crowd, threw him to the ground, and attempted to gouge out his eyes and slice off his tongue. This brutal assault left Leo bleeding and unconscious, but it would paradoxically lead to the greatest expansion of papal authority in centuries. This episode explores how personal attack became political transformation, setting the stage for the creation of

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6:47

Madonna asks Pope Leo to visit Gaza

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/14

Madonna has penned an emotional appeal to Pope Leo, urging the religious leader to make a pastoral journey to Gaza amid the ongoing humanitarian crisis. The pop superstar shared her plea through social media on Monday, as the conflict between Israeli forces and Hamas continues to escalate.In her open letter, Madonna wrote, "Your Holiness, I implore you to travel to Gaza and offer hope to the suffering children while there is still time. As someone who has raised children, witnessing their anguish is

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17:36

23. Monks and Missionaries - The Papacy's Expansion...

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/10

From Rome's ancient center, a new papal strategy emerges through monastic missionaries dispatched to Europe's pagan frontiers. This episode follows how Pope Gregory the Great's vision of northern evangelization, tensions between Irish and Roman Christian models, and Boniface's systematic organization of Germanic churches fundamentally reoriented papal priorities. The culminating alliance with the Franks, marked by Pope Stephen II's historic Alpine crossing, transformed the papacy from Mediterranean

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7:58

World's Most Popular Leader, Pope Leo, gets a pizza...

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/07

Pope Leo XIV just topped global popularity polls while receiving epic pizza deliveries at the Vatican! Discover how America's first pope became the world's most beloved leader with a staggering 57% approval rating, crushing everyone from Elon Musk to world politicians. This episode dives deep into the incredible story of how devoted Catholics smuggled his favorite Aurelio's deep-dish pizza from Chicago to Rome, surviving van breakdowns, TSA drama, and a dramatic rescue from a Roman trash can. This

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16:23

22. The Barbarian Popes - Leading a Church in the...

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/08/03

When the last Western Roman Emperor was deposed in 476 CE, the papacy faced an existential crisis. This episode examines how popes from Simplicius to Gregory the Great transformed potential catastrophe into institutional opportunity, preserving Roman administrative traditions while forging diplomatic relationships with new barbarian rulers. Gelasius I's "two swords" doctrine, the complex navigation between Constantinople and Ostrogothic Italy, and Gregory's practical governance innovations reveal

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9:51

The Pope's Barber

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/07/31

Mario Reyes, a thirty seven year old barber from Ica, Peru, has been working near the Vatican walls for three years. His barbershop computer contains client records, and among his regular customers was someone listed simply as Robert Francis Prevost.Become a premium subscriber! (no ads and no feed drops). For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app which says UNINTERRUPTED LISTENING. You also get 25+ other series from comedy to paranormal, royals, romance, trivia, politics, movies,

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20:47

21. Theology and Power - The Papacy After Constantine

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/07/27

As Christianity became the empire's favored religion, theological debates took on political dimensions. This episode explores how popes from Julius I to Damasus I navigated the Arian controversy that divided the 4th-century church while developing more explicit theories of Roman primacy. The imprisoned Pope Liberius, the violent election of Damasus, and the emerging concept of papal decretals reveal how doctrinal conflicts shaped institutional authority in lasting ways as the papacy claimed both

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8:23

The Pope Plays Piano—and Has Celebrity Cousins

White Smoke - Pope Leo XIV the American Pope ·

2025/07/24

Turns out Pope Leo is a classically trained pianist with a taste for Bartók. We learn about his musical past, his remarkable high school years, and his deeply moving genealogy session with Henry Louis Gates Jr., which revealed distant ties to Madonna, Angelina Jolie, Justin Bieber, and even Hillary Clinton. Later, artisans prepare to add Pope Leo’s mosaic to the legendary portrait wall at Saint Paul Outside the Walls—reviving an ancient end-times superstition.Portions of this program were made with

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