Pope Francis has appointed 13 new cardinals, 10 of whom are under age 80, Religious News Service is reporting.
With the creation of the cardinals, the Pope has so far named 91 cardinals, thus diversifying the College of Cardinals.
The pontiff had promised in 2016 he would appoint new cardinals at the 2019 Ordinary Public consistory, including 13 cardinals under the age of 80 and four over that age.
About 50 per cent of the cardinal electors now come from the developing world.
The Cardinals-designate, who come from 11 countries, are Bishop Alvaro Ramazzini Imeri of San Marcos, Guatemala, named on September 1; Bishop of Huehuetenango, Bishop Álvaro Ramazzini Imeri, 72; Archbishop Cristóbal López Romero, S.D.B. (Spain), 67, archbishop of Rabat, Morocco; Bishop Eugenio dal Corso, P.S.D.P. (Italy), 80, bishop emeritus of Benguela;
Congolese Archbishop Fridolin Abongo Besungu, O.F.M. CAP (Democratic Republic of the Congo), 59, archbishop of Kinshasa; Archbishop Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo, (Indonesia), 69, archbishop of Jakarta, Indonesia; Cardinal-designate Jean-Claude Hollerich, S.J. 61, archbishop of Luxembourg.
Others are José Tolentino Calaça de Mendonça (Portugal), 53, archbishop, chief archivist and librarian of the Holy Roman church; Archbishop Juan de la Caridad García Rodríguez (Cuba), 71, archbishop of San Cristòbal de Havana; Archbishop Matteo Zuppi, (Italy), 63, archbishop of Bologna; Father Michael Czerny, S.J. (Czechoslovakia and Canada), 73, undersecretary for the section of migrants in the Dicastery for the Service for Integral Human Development; Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald; m. Af. (England), 82, archbishop emeritus of Nepte; Archbishop Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot, M.C.C.J. (Spain), 67, archbishop and president of the pontifical council for inter-religious dialogue; and Sigitas Tamkevicius, (Lithuania), 81, archbishop emeritus of Kuanas.
The cardinals are eligible to vote at the next conclave for the pope’s successor.
At a ceremony in St. Peter’s Basilica, the pope gave the new cardinals their trademark red biretta, or hat, just as he enjoined them to always be compassionate with others and loyal.
Religious News Service reported the Head of Vatican’s Pontiff Council for Interreligious Dialogue and Spanish Bishop, Miguel Angel Ayuso Guixot, as saying that Pope Francis “made it understood that the church is a church on the move, a church open to all realities. And here I see this wealth in variety.”
Ayuso said the new appointments showcase the “pastoral, missionary and interreligious dimension of the consistory.”
“I think the pope wanted to make visible the churches that were almost invisible,” Archbishop Romero told journalists at the Vatican. “He wanted to say to us that we are moving in a good direction, and we have to continue to work on the interreligious and inter-Christian dialogue and immigrant people.”
