Bears Fans Won't Be Too Jazzed About Pope Leo Blessing Lions TE Sam LaPorta

We're in uncharted territory with an American-born pope, and already we have our first very American controversy involving Leo XIV. Blame Detroit Lions tight end Sam LaPorta.

Now, as you're no doubt aware, Pope Leo is a Chicago guy. I mean, just last week he was doing White Sox chants through Vatican City, so he's practically one of Bill Swerski's Superfans.

LaPorta visited the Vatican and received a blessing from the Pontiff.

That's big for the Lions — and obviously for the LaPortas, personally — but Bears fans won't be too happy about seeing their hometown pope dishing out blessings to an NFC North rival.

Although, can you imagine if he had met a Packer? There'd be mayhem on the streets of Chicago… more than usual.

But like I said, this is uncharted territory. I'm not sure there's ever been a pope who is a big sports fan. Or at least a sport we Americans would care about. Is he allowed to pass on giving out a blessing to a player for a rival team? I've got to assume that that would be frowned upon, and not very Pope-ly.

But could he maybe give a partial blessing? Like, enough that LaPorta plays the whole season without injury, but maybe he drops a few passes in key moments when the Lions play the Bears. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, right?

I mean, sometimes you've got to do what you've got to do to support the team, but good on the Pope for doing the right thing in this situation.

But let's not pretend that means he'll be cheering for LaPorta on at least two weekends this fall. Maybe he'll even throw on the custom Bears jersey he received last month courtesy of US Vice President JD Vance.

Also, I bet that order threw the folks at Fanatics through a loop when they saw that they had to put Roman numerals on a jersey.