My Friend, Pope Bob: How a friendship that began in the seminary has thrived across decades

John and Polly Snider spoke with Plough editor Santiago Ramos about their decades-long friendship with Pope Leo XIV, whom they know as Bob. The friendship began in the summer of 1980 during a ten-week Clinical Pastoral Education program at a hospital in Minneapolis.

At the time, Robert Prevost was a seminarian training to become a priest, while John Snider was studying to become a Lutheran pastor. The group of five participants engaged in hospital chaplaincy training that included a practice called a verbatim. This required students to record and report ministerial encounters, such as meetings with people on their deathbeds, to the group to discuss their words and emotions.