In spring of 2023, after eight days as Archbishop of Toronto, his Grace Francis Leo ended a long interview with The Catholic Register by speaking of the “many possibilities here in Toronto for the Kingdom of God” that he foresaw. It’s doubtful even he foresaw as one of those possibilities that 20 months and one week later, he would be in Rome to receive the red hat of a cardinal. (Anyone who did foresee it wasn’t saying so publicly at the time.) 

Leo noted in our interview that what some consider his “overnight sensation” rise to the pinnacle of the Roman Catholic Church in Canada actually involved 50 years of faithful preparation — almost his entire life at 53 — through the sacraments and then clerical roles, responsibilities and offices. Despite that half-century of getting ready, his elevation to the College of Cardinals caught even him by surprise. As the Register reported after the news was announced in mid-October, he learned he was a Cardinal-elect because family and friends started calling him after seeing the news on the web. 

The Register hoped for a follow-up interview between the announcement and Archbishop Leo’s departure for the Dec. 7 consistory. Alas, scheduling didn’t cooperate. We trust this edited version of the 2023 interview will refresh readers’ sense of the who, what and why of Canada’s 18th Cardinal since 1886.

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Catholic Register: Your motto is, “Just do what He tells you.” What does it mean to you? 

Archbishop Francis Leo: It’s taken from the first miracle Our Lord ever made at the Cana of Galilee. And they are the last recorded words of the Blessed Mother in the Scriptures. They’re sort of her spiritual last will and testament. What she’s telling us is we always need to refer back to Christ, who is the centre. As I like to put it, Our Lady is not the centre, but she is central. In our walk with the Lord, and our pursuit of the path of holiness in the Church as a missionary disciple, Our Lady holds a central place.

That first miracle, which speaks volumes to us, it could be interpreted as, well, it’s a sign, right? It doesn’t call them miracles, but signs which point to Christ, His identity and His mission. Our Lady is part of that. She’s part of the miracle making. She’s part of the new wine that Christ came to give us. And sort of like the Heavenly Father, who, at baptism, we hear His voice, the baptism of Christ, and also at the Transfiguration: “This is my son, in whom I am well pleased. Listen to Him.” 

Now we have our heavenly mother who’s pointing to the same saying, “This is Jesus. Do whatever He tells you.” It’s our vocation as a Christian to be a child of God, and a disciple, brother or sister, of Christ, temple of the Holy Spirit, member of the Church. Our Lady is saying, “Keep your eyes focused on Christ, like I did.”  It means fulfilling the will of Christ, who always fulfills the will of the Father. In doing the will of God, we find peace and meaning and hope in our own journey. And we have a mother, His mother, to walk with us. She’s always pointing back to her son, saying that we are to do whatever Christ asks of us. 

Catholic Register: She’s actually quite bossy. She says, “Hey, you’ve got to do this. We’re out of wine here.” She’s a quintessential Jewish mother. And He’s like so many sons being bossed around by their mothers: “Listen, I’m not ready to do that yet.”

Francis Leo: My hour is not come yet.

CR: She pushes Him out the door, so to speak.

FL:  She’s the catalyzer of the first miracle. And that boldness, which speaks to the relationship they had of mother and son. And this again is beautiful. On the one hand we’re called to humility but to be also very bold with our prayers, and go to Jesus and ask Him what we really need with faith, and trust, and humility, of course, that His will be done. That’s the condition. His will be done always. What she’s telling us is your request, your prayers of intercession, need to be based on a relationship with my son Jesus. Belonging to the family. She’s a biological mother, but Jesus also opened up to the eschatological family. The family of the Kingdom. And it’s by faith we enter that family. His mother in the order of nature, but also His disciple in the order of grace, and the best, most perfect follower of Christ. What she’s telling us is: “Bring your concerns, your woes, your joys, your problems and your requests to my son.” She’s also there as the one who intercedes for us. And at the Calvary, He gives her to be our spiritual mother, Mother of the Church, universal Mother. And we adopt her. We bring her home, as St. John did. I think it also highlights the importance of Our Lady’s intercessory role right now in Heaven. As the Council tells us, she constantly intercedes for the brothers and sisters of her son in our pilgrimage of faith. And that’s an essential element of our walk in the Church.

CR: Wikipedia gives your birthdate in two blocks that essentially represent two and a half decades each of your life. The recent changes in your life are given in decimal points of years. You’re announced as auxiliary bishop in Montreal, 51.3 years, installed as auxiliary bishop, 51.5 years, and so on.  Might you have had a human response similar to Our Lord’s: “I’m not ready for this yet. Why are you pushing me out the door?” And Our Lady saying, “Come on, it’s time. You’ve got to do this.”

FL: Well first of all, thank you. I didn’t know there was (a Wikipedia) article on me, so I need to look into that. But you’ve hit it on the head in terms of me experiencing this call within the call, if you will. I’m looking at it through the eyes of the Annunciation. Our Lady’s question is: “How is this possible?” I asked that too. This is happening very quickly. But then again, her example of complete surrender to the will of God, her acceptance of God’s plan for her, even though she didn’t have the blueprints in front of her. She entrusted her life and her future into the hands of God, who is most trustworthy of all, the most loving of all, all knowing, all powerful and all loving and omnipresent. Her relationship with the Lord and her deep faith allowed her to say “yes” when she didn’t have all of the answers. And that’s her greatness too: her humility and her purity, of course, and her deep charity, and trust in the Lord. If He was asking her, things were going to be okay in the end.

CR: She is telling you to say ‘yes’ and do what He tells you.

FL: She definitely is. I’m basing it on her fiat. God’s asking me through Holy Mother Church and through the voice of the Holy Father to do something I would’ve never thought of. I did not seek, but I’m asked to serve in another way. Our whole life as a life of service. I’ve served the Lord as a priest, as a deacon, and before that as a baptized person. Now I’ve been asked to continue to serve the Kingdom. It’s all about Jesus and doing His will and His Kingdom. That’s what we seek first and foremost.The Lord has been preparing me for 50 years for this. We need to look at it from a supernatural perspective. I’m a child of God, called and empowered like all other Christians to do work for the Kingdom. I trust Him and I entrust my life and my future, my ministry into His hands and His heart. I know He will walk with me and ask His mother to walk with me in a special way. I do believe that very much.

CR: Are there saints to whom you say, “Give me strength. Help me unpack the boxes?”

FL:  Drawing from my six years at the CCCB (Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops) I did get to know the Church in Canada in a very close-up way, worked in a parochial diocese and the international (experience) with the Holy See. And I find myself truly blessed to have been able to serve the Church in Canada for six years (as secretary-general of the CCCB), which gave me a very widespread perspective and knowledge of the Church in its beauty and in its weaknesses across the country.

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I find myself drawing a lot from that experience. As for saints, I mean, number one, of course, is Our Lady who is our role model of every Christian, first and foremost. The other saints that I would turn to would be St. Joseph, patron saint of Canada. I was briefly pastor of St. Joseph’s Church in Montreal. St. Dominic, I’m a Dominican third order member. St. John Bosco, as I was growing up, was very important. And then some of the holy bishops of the Church. I have a fondness for the fathers of the Church. I read extensively and taught patristics for many years. You’ve got Ambrose and Augustine and St. John Chrysostom and the Cappadocians, Leo the Great, and Gregory the Great, and other Eastern fathers who blended in a beautifully harmoniously way personal sanctity and mystic life of prayer. St. Alphonsus Liguori is one of my favourites, and Francis de Sales, Charles Borromeo. 

CR: Are there individuals of whom you say, “Oh yes, this is what so and so would have done, or this is what has helped me in a way that I need to pass on to somebody else”? 

FL: I would say three categories of people. One would be my family. The second would be the parish priests I grew up with, my home parish. And the third would be the umpteen priests who taught me, and formed me, and trained me at the seminary and in the diplomatic service. Those categories of persons and spiritual directors, who I think contributed a lot to me becoming a priest and following the Lord. Depending on the issue, I would turn back and say, “What would this person or that person say, my family, priest of the parish growing up,” and then the other... and lay people, I must say. How high I’ve been edified, challenged and blessed in keeping friends with the laity all throughout my years in keeping it real connected to the grassroots level.

Even as I was studying to become a priest, I always kept friends, lay people. I think it’s very healthy. I would share with them in my own ministry, my own life and their ministry and their life. What you want to avoid all the time is to be isolated in your own ivory tower. That is not the way of Christ, nor should it be our way. 

CR: In your generation in Montreal, there was a need for people of Italian heritage to navigate. You were born after the riots in Saint-Leonard over language rights. You still had to navigate between the two dominant linguistic groups, French and English. You absorb that, don’t you?  You listen for the accent, and then…

FL: Exactly. In Montreal, you do. You navigate between the three languages in my case. We grew up speaking Italian at home, English at school, a little French at school, and then French in the lane, playing with the kids. You learn to appreciate diversity, although the difficulties were still there as well. In my family, an immigrant family, you work hard. You are connected to the Church. We have the sacraments. It’s about family, and it’s about providing for each other, providing for a good future and a sense of sacrifice and a sense of respect to God, respect for your elders, respect for the institutions, respect for God, faith, respect for the government. Respect is big. And the selflessness and sacrifices you need to do, that was big growing up. It’s part of who I am as well.

CR: You find the connection points…

Francis Leo:  I don’t impose my way, but I need to understand where you’re coming from. And I can appreciate the differences. In building unity, getting along, be it playing on the playground or in the lane, at school.

CR: How do your foresee adapting to the changes your new role will demand?

FL: Well, what helps me is my exposure to the international scene having lived in Australia, in Hong Kong, for example, exposed to other realities where the Church is not all that prominent or is the minority as in Hong Kong. You approach an issue with humility, trying to see first and foremost the wonderful things at hand, and then saying, “I want to contribute to that.” There will never be a perfect world. There’s no perfection this side of Heaven. We have to factor in the human element. My approach is: How can I contribute to increase it even more? Definitely there are differences. We can go through them, and we’ll be here till the Second Coming.

CR: But where the Church is literally on its knees, reduced to absolute essentials, how do you carry that sense of grievous woundedness yet extraordinary strength with you?

FL: I think you need to avoid ideology at every cost and be grounded in reality. This is who we are right here, right now. We can learn from the past and we can learn from others. And always humility. We know what comes after pride. If we get too cocky, the Holy Spirit will not be part of that equation. We need to celebrate the wonderful things, and to continue to grow, but stay humble as well because things can change fast. We cannot be content with just numbers because numbers are numbers. We need to go beyond the numbers and see the people. the communities, the struggles, work with them at the grassroots level and strengthen people in their walk of faith. Our ideal is the Gospel. It’s Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. And Our Lord gave us the game plan. We’re not alone. The challenges remain, and we will face them together.

CR: Do you set priorities and then tick the boxes to make sure you get your priorities accomplished? Or do you say, “What’s the priority of the people around me?”

FL: There’s the wonderful Catholic approach of “both/and.” I do have priorities and like to achieve them, but we need to discuss those together. First, we listen and ask questions to see what the Holy Spirit is telling us right now: where people are at, what they think needs to be done, what needs to be changed, to be adopted, what they see is important. We put that next to the Gospels. Any priorities need to be grounded in the positive faith, grounded in where the people are at. Otherwise, you’re imposing an ideology. That won’t won’t fly. It would be a waste of time for me to come in with preconceived ideas and say, “This is the way it’s going to be done.” That’s crazy talk. It’s arrogant. It doesn’t work. 

CR: Your predecessor Cardinal Thomas Collins once said, “Even in a monastery, the second assistant bell ringer wants to be the first assistant bell ringer. And there’s nothing wrong with that, unless it gets out of line.” He meant ambition has to come with an equal dose of awareness that if you’re going to make the bells ring their best, you’ve got to pay more attention to the bells than to yourself and your ambition. You’ve had an amazing career trajectory, you’ve moved into the top ecclesiastical jobs in the country, how do you keep, within yourself, that sense of, look, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to go on and do better things, but I have to stay… 

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FL: The pursuit of excellence could be a very virtuous pursuit as long as it is tempered with humility. I think being grounded in prayer, in a deep spirituality, and a deep faith and humility. “Humilitas veritas,” St. Therese of Jesus used to say, which means a humble person is one who realizes his giftedness and uses it for God’s glory. A truthful reading of who I am in terms of my gifts, but also my weaknesses, my brokenness, my woundedness, where I need help, where I need the grace of God and redemption to come, those aspects, corners of my heart.

And knowing first and foremost that God is the first actor of evangelization in His Church. Prayer and virtuous life, healthy relationships, devotion in the singular devotion to Christ, His Gospel, devotions in the plural, the sacraments, the means of grace, you know, will keep me, keep all of us, grounded and humble.