ROME
Vatican Insider

Vatican Insider takes a trip to the Church, dear to Ignatius of Loyola, where the meetings which strengthened Bergoglio’s candidacy were held

GIACOMO GALEAZZI
Vatican City

Saint Ignatius of Loyola celebrated his first mass here, on Christmas night in 1538. A stop at Saint Mary Major has always been a must during the Jesuit Bergoglio’s travels to the eternal city. Deeply devoted to the patroness of Rome (the Salus Populi Romani), he began his pontificate from the basilica which houses a relic of the Manger in Bethlehem and Bernini’s tomb. “He is very fond of this church, he came often as a cardinal,” says Fr. Elio Monteleone, one of the confessors in the West’s oldest Marian Sanctuary.

Yesterday morning, the newly elected Pope said to confessors: “Souls need you to be merciful; pray for me.” A Marian Pope like Wojtyla, who consecrated his pontificate to…