WATCH: American Pope’s conservative approach to LGBTQ+ issues revealed

Cardinal Robert Prevost, a 69-year-old Chicago native, became the first American-born pope in the Catholic Church’s history when plumes of white smoke rose over the Sistine Chapel Thursday.

He took the name Leo XIV.

As he replaces Pope Francis, who initially made Prevost a cardinal, the views held by Prevost do not always align with those of his predecessor. His views on homosexuality and the LGBTQ+ community stand as one of the biggest contrasts between them.

Pope Robert Prevost on homosexuality

“The Western mass media is extraordinarily effective in fostering within the general public enormous sympathy for beliefs and practices that are at odds with the gospel,” Prevost said in 2012, according to a video published by the Catholic News Service in 2012, unearthed by “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio.

During an address to the World Synod of Bishops, Prevost blamed mass media for cultivating “sympathy for anti-Christian lifestyle choices.”

“Religion is at best tolerated by mass media as tame and quaint when it does not actively oppose positions on ethical issues that the media have embraced as their own,” Prevost said. “However, when religious voices are raised in opposition to these positions, mass media can target religion, labeling it as ideological and insensitive in regard to the so-called vital needs of people in the contemporary world.”

His address specifically discussed how “alternative families comprised of same-sex partners” are portrayed in contemporary media.

Prevost called for a “new evangelization to counter these mass media-produced distortions of religious and ethical reality.”

Pope Francis’ differing views on homosexuality, LGBTQ+ issues

Pope Francis was frequently vocal about his views on homosexuality and has been credited with a “seismic shift” towards accepting the LGBTQ+ community.

“If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?” Pope Francis famously said, adding that being gay is “not a crime.” He described the criminalization of the LGBTQ+ community as “wrong.”

“My hope is that he follows in the footsteps of Pope Francis, who really had done more than any other Pope had done in terms of accepting the LGBTQ+ community,” Ursula Reutin, co-host of “The Gee and Ursula Show,” said. “Not going all the way, but basically saying things like he supported civil union laws for same sex couples, saying that homosexuals have a right to be a part of the family. He said they’re children of God, they have a right to a family. Nobody should be thrown out or be made miserable because of it. Those were huge things.”

“God forbid I’m judged on my thoughts and views from 12 years ago,” KIRO Newsradio fill-in host Angela Poe Russell added. “There’s a little bit of a difference in that he is a leader, but leaders evolve. Good ones do.”

Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.