Before becoming Pope Francis, he was Argentinian Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the former archbishop of Buenos Aires. The announcement for the selection of a new pope came on Wednesday, March 13, the first full day of the cardinals' conclave in the Sistine Chapel.
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Bergoglio arrives for the congregation meeting at Synod Hall in the Vatican on March 7.
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Bergoglio, right, draws the cross on the forehead of a parishioner during a Mass for Ash Wednesday, which begins the 40-day period of abstinence for Christians before the Holy Week and Easter, on February 13 at the Metropolitan Cathedral in Buenos Aires.
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Bergoglio says a Mass in honor of the late ex-President Nestor Carlos Kirchner on October 27, 2010, in Buenos Aires.
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During a Mass against trafficking in July 12, 2010, in Buenos Aires, Bergoglio speaks.
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Bergoglio delivers his homily at the church of St. Cajetan in Buenos Aires on August 7, 2009.
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Then-Archbishop of Buenos Aires Bergoglio is seen in Vatican City in this undated photo. He's the first non-European pope in the modern era and the first South American pope.
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Pope Benedict XVI meets Bergoglio at the Vatican in January 2007.
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Bergoglio, right, and Peru's Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne attend the special "pro eligendo summo pontifice" (to elect supreme pontiff) Mass in Vatican City in April 2005.
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Cardinal Bergoglio, center, officiates a Holy Mass for the eternal rest of Pope John Paul II on April 5, 2005, at Buenos Aires' Metropolitan Cathedral.
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Bergoglio is shown washing the feet of a woman on Holy Thursday at the Sarda maternity hospital in Buenos Aires in 2005.
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Bergoglio smiles during a news conference at the Vatican in October 2003. during celebrations marking the 25th anniversary of Pope John Paul II's election.
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Pope John Paul II receives Cardinal Bergoglio, archbishop of Buenos Aires, Argentina, at the Vatican on February 21, 2001.
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This undated photo shows Bergoglio, who was appointed a cardinal by Pope John Paul II.