No one loves their city quite like Chicagoans do, with a swaggering loyalty that blurs civic pride into something closer to religious conviction, a hometown devotion that doubles as a perfectly seared side-eye to the coasts. That said, we don’t take ourselves too seriously — something that’s palpable, even to outsiders. Anthony Bourdain, a dyed-in-the-wool New Yorker with a keen eye for the soul of a place, once called Chicago one of America’s last great “no bulls**t zones,” a place where “pomposity, pretentiousness, putting on airs of any kind, douchery and lack of a sense of humor will not get you far.”
So perhaps it’s no surprise that when the news broke of the election of Robert Prevost as Pope Leo XIV — the first American pope, born and raised in Chicago — the city responded first with reverence, then with a flood of food jokes. That is, after the “Blues Brothers” bits cleared the airspace. (He is a man on a mission from God, after all.)
Within hours of the white smoke billowing from the Sistine Chapel chimney, someone had photoshopped the Vatican façade to look like a Portillo’s. Another declared that the new holy water was Malört. And when I texted my far more devout brother to ask what he thought, he replied instantly: “This is a man who has eaten a hot dog. This is a man who has had deep dish pizza.”
While drafting this story, an email pinged into my inbox like divine timing. Portillo’s — yes, that Portillo’s—was launching a limited-time menu item in honor of the new pontiff.
“In the name of the gravy, the bun, and the hot giard, we introduce The Leo: a divinely seasoned Italian beef, baptized in gravy and finished with the holy trinity of peppers — sweet, hot, or a combo,” the press release read. It went on to call the sandwich “bold, unapologetically flavorful,” and “made in honor of a moment that’s historic for Portillo’s hometown.” I couldn’t stop laughing. Not because it was a little ridiculous, but because it was perfect.
Yeah, apparently Peru has an agreement with the Vatican that their Bishops have to be Peruvian citizens. So he had to become a citizen when he was elevated to bishop there.
Do we have a thread here like we did at TOP on things that always start arguments? I know deep dish “pizza” was on there. Tavern style is legit pizza, though. You guys did good with that one.
Deep dish is characterized by the pan in which the pizza is prepared. The crust lines the bottom and sides of the pan and then filled with the ingredients. A thick-ish pizza is still prepared flat.
The deep-dish vs casserole boundary is roughly defined by a radius of 100 miles from downtown Chicago.
Here’s a long but very good Bluesky thread, about the new Pope’s first sermon, what it means, and what’s wrong with so much American Christianity these days. Well worth reading; even if you already know a lot of what rahaeli is talking about, her synthesis is excellent and eye-opening.
Initial drawings for the proposed park included a soccer field and pickleball courts, but Rodrick said nothing is set in stone. He did say that any park would include a large playground. He hopes the dispute with the church can be resolved soon, saying that the congregation could use the funds from any sale to relocate or fund other ministries.
“I would rather come to an amicable settlement,” he said.
Sounds just extortion to me: Sell us your 11-acre church campus or we’ll seize it using eminent domain because you don’t use your parking lot more than once a week. Anyway, we won’t allow you to build a small 17-bed homeless shelter on your property. We’d rather you think of all the housed persons in our community and their pickleball needs!
“There’s a real need for the local residents up in those neighborhoods to be able to walk somewhere and put their kids on a swing,” said Rodrick in a recent phone interview. “I just think it’s a very positive thing. And I believe Christ would agree.”
(Literally, if I ever go back to do the PhD I always wanted to do, my dissertation will be on how rap music serves the same theological function for the American civil religion as the biblical Prophets did for the kingdom of Israel. But I digress. Again.)
