The love story that led to the papacy
Long before the white robes and the weight of leading 1.4 billion Catholics, Jorge Mario Bergoglio was just a boy in Flores, a modest neighbourhood in Buenos Aires. And like many 12-year-olds, he fell in love.
Her name was Amalia Damonte, the girl next door—literally. They lived just four doors apart. She remembers his charm, his intensity, and, most famously, the letter. “If I can’t marry you, I’ll become a priest,” young Jorge wrote, declaring his boyish love with dramatic flair. Amalia, in 2013, chuckled when she recounts the memory. “Luckily for him,” she says, smiling, “I said no.”
It may sound like a romantic anecdote shared over afternoon tea, but that moment—one of innocent heartbreak and quiet rebellion—would shape the course of history. Pope Francis, as the world now knows him, might have lived a very different life had Amalia said yes.
Love, rejection, and a higher calling
Their love was never meant to be. Amalia’s parents disapproved of their budding childhood romance, going so far as to punish her for writing a note back. “My father hit me because I dared to write to a boy,” she once recalled to the Argentine press after Jorge Mario became Pope Francis in 2013. The message was clear: their connection, however sweet and sincere, had no future.
For Jorge, it was a heartbreak that didn't just scar—it transformed. Cut off from his first love and burdened by rejection, he turned inward, toward faith. The path of priesthood, once a distant notion, suddenly became his purpose.
That early heartbreak, some say, helped forge the empathy and humility that would define his papacy decades later. As Pope, Francis became known for embracing the poor, living simply, and urging the Church toward compassion over condemnation. Perhaps it began with that youthful vow, penned not from a pulpit, but from a place of unrequited love.
A sister’s worry, a church’s hope
Years later, as the world watched white smoke rise over the Vatican, it was another woman close to Bergoglio who reflected on the cost of that path. María Elena Bergoglio, the Pope’s only living sibling, confessed she had hoped he would not be chosen. “He said, jokingly, ‘No, please no,’” she told reporters. “I didn’t want him to become Pope because he’s going to be very far away... and because it’s such a large responsibility.”
Still, her pride was evident. “He’s the first from outside Europe. He’s Latin American. He’s Argentine. And he’s my brother.”
From Flores to the Vatican
On March 13, 2013, Jorge Mario Bergoglio became Pope Francis, the 266th pontiff of the Catholic Church—and the first ever from the Americas. He inherited a church in crisis, dealing with scandal, dwindling vocations, and growing secularism. But he also brought something different: the heart of a man who once knew the sting of rejection and the comfort of faith.
And somewhere in Buenos Aires, the woman who once said no smiles quietly. “I believe he made the right choice,” Amalia had said then.
Because sometimes, the end of one love story is the beginning of something much bigger.
