Meet the 21 New Cardinals!

By CNS – Pope Francis is scheduled to create 21 new cardinals on Dec. 7, giving the red hat to prelates ranging in age from 44 to 99 and representing 17 countries.

The new class of cardinals includes bishops and archbishops who spent most of their priesthood in parish ministry, many who have served in seminaries and several who have been members of the Vatican diplomatic corps.

When the pope announced in October that he would make them cardinals, three members of the group were not yet bishops: the theologian and English Dominican Father Timothy Radcliffe; Italian Scalabrinian Father Fabio Baggio, undersecretary and head of the section for migrants and refugees at the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development; and Indian Msgr. George Jacob Koovakad, an official of the Vatican Secretariat of State who is responsible for organising papal trips.

The following are brief biographical sketches of the 21 new cardinals-designate, listed in the order in which Pope Francis announced them:

— Cardinal-designate Archbishop Angelo Acerbi

At 99 years old, Archbishop Angelo Acerbi will become the oldest member of the College of Cardinals when he receives his red hat Dec. 7 from Pope Francis.

A career Vatican diplomat, in February 1980 he spent two months as a hostage of Colombia’s M-19 guerrilla group. The militants seized Archbishop Acerbi and dozens of other hostages during a diplomatic reception at the Dominican Republic’s embassy in Bogota. Archbishop Acerbi celebrated Mass for the hostages each day they were held in the embassy, including on Easter.

After repeated rounds of negotiation and the occasional release of a few hostages, Fidel Castro offered the militants asylum in Cuba. The 16 guerrillas flew with Archbishop Acerbi and 11 other diplomats to Havana where the hostages were freed.

Born Sept. 23, 1925, in Sesta Godano, Italy, he did his seminary studies in Pontremoli and was ordained to the priesthood in 1948. After studying at the Pontifical Ecclesiatical Academy, the Vatican school for diplomats in Rome, he entered the Vatican diplomatic service in 1956. He had postings in Colombia, Brazil, France, Japan, Portugal and the Vatican Secretariat of State before being named an archbishop and nuncio to New Zealand by St. Paul VI in 1974.

After being taken hostage, he remained nuncio to Colombia until 1990 when St. John Paul II made him the first post-communist nuncio to Hungary. He was nuncio to Moldova and then to the Netherlands before retiring in 2001. He resides at the Vatican in the Domus Sanctae Marthae where Pope Francis also lives.

— Cardinal-designate Carlos Gustavo Castillo Mattasoglio

Cardinal-designate Carlos Gustavo Castillo Mattasoglio of Lima, Peru, is an academic theologian with strong pastoral priorities closely aligned with the late Dominican Father Gustavo Gutierrez, the “father of liberation theology” which emphasised a preferential option of the poor.

Born Feb. 28, 1950, he earned a bachelor’s degree in social sciences and as a student joined Peru’s National Union of Catholic Students, through which he met and befriended Father Gutierrez. Entering the seminary, he studied in Peru before being sent to study philosophy and theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. Ordained to the priesthood in 1984, he completed his doctorate in dogmatic theology at the Gregorian in 1987 and returned home to teach at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru.

In 2019 Pope Francis named him archbishop of Lima and primate of Peru, replacing Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani — a member Opus Dei who publicly criticised liberation theology and said its foundational texts “did much damage” to the church.

Archbishop Castillo wrote his first pastoral letter as archbishop in 2020 on the “pastoral conversion” of Lima, calling for a social, human and ecological conversion in the Peruvian capital and among its 3 million Catholics.

As archbishop he has criticised the Peru’s handling of a historic crime wave in the country and has been vocal in calling for end to what he has said is extortion in the Peruvian government. He wrote a scathing article in the leading Spanish newspaper, El País, in October calling for the Vatican to suppress the Peru-based Catholic movement Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, several members of which have been accused of abuse.

In an interview with Vatican News following his nomination, Cardinal-designate Castillo said the greatest challenge for a cardinal is to “be a sign of hope for humanity amid so many crises and tensions that exist in the world today.”

— Cardinal-designate Vicente Bokalic Iglic

Archbishop Vicente Bokalic Iglic, 72, worked alongside Pope Francis in Argentina and was appointed by him to be bishop of Santiago del Estero, Argentina; he became the first archbishop of Santiago del Estero when Pope Francis raised it to the rank of archdiocese in July 2024.

Upon becoming archbishop, he also become primate of Argentina, a title previously held by the archbishop of Buenos Aires, but which Pope Francis changed to continue the church’s tradition of granting the title of primate to archbishop of the oldest episcopal see in a country.

The archbishop was born outside of Buenos Aires on June 11, 1952, and joined the Vincentians in 1970; he was ordained a priest in 1976. He served in parish ministry, at the Vincentian seminary and held various offices in his congregation until 2003 when he began a six-year term as the Vincentian provincial superior.

Pope Benedict XVI appointed him auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires in 2010; the principal consecrator at his episcopal ordination was then-Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Buenos Aires. The two worked together in the archdiocese until Cardinal Bergoglio was elected to the papacy in 2013.

Nine months after becoming pope, Pope Francis named him bishop of Santiago del Estero, the oldest episcopal see in Argentina, erected in its first form in 1570. Today the archdiocese counts more than 800,000 Catholics.

— Cardinal-designate Luis Gerardo Cabrera Herrera

Cardinal-designate Luis Gerardo Cabrera Herrera of Guayaquil, Ecuador, will be the first cardinal from Ecuador’s largest city. Although he will be the sixth cardinal from Ecuador, previous Ecuadorian cardinals were primarily from Quito, the nation’s capital, while one came from the small city of Ibarra.

Born in the small town of Azogues Oct. 11, 1955, the archbishop entered the Franciscan novitiate in Quito at 19 years old. He received his doctorate in philosophy from the Pontifical Antonianum University in Rome and was ordained a priest in 1983.

Following several assignments in Ecuador, Archbishop Cabrera served in Rome as the Franciscan minister general’s delegate for Latin America and the Caribbean region from 2003-2009.

Pope Benedict XVI appointed him archbishop of Cuenca in 2009. In 2015, Pope Francis appointed him archbishop of Guayaquil, home to approximately 3 million Catholics.

Archbishop Cabrera was elected to serve three-year terms as president of the Ecuadorian bishops’ conference in 2020 and again in 2023. In January 2024, he criticised policies enacted by Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa in response to drug abuse and trafficking in the country and in the city of Guayaquil. He said that the declaration of an internal state of war in Ecuador and mandatory curfew were “extreme” measures that ignored the root causes of why people are driven to violence.

“It is not enough to repress, control or, as they say now, neutralise” the violence, the archbishop said. “It is necessary to go to the causes because it is a time bomb that will explode with greater force in any circumstance,” he said, calling for increased government investments in health, education, housing and labour protections.

Archbishop Cabrera was a president delegate at the Synod of Bishops on synodality which ended in October.

— Cardinal-designate Fernando Natalio Chomalí Garib

Cardinal-designate Fernando Natalio Chomalí Garib of Santiago, Chile, was born in the Chilean capital March 10, 1957, the son of Palestinian immigrants.

He studied civil engineering at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and later philosophy and theology at the Pontifical Major Seminary of Santiago before being ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Santiago in 1991. He holds a licentiate in moral theology from the Pontifical Alphonsian Academy, a doctorate in theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University and a master’s degree in bioethics from the Pontifical John Paul II Theological Institute for Marriage and Family Sciences, all institutions based in Rome. He was named a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life in 2001.

In 2006, Pope Benedict XVI named him auxiliary bishop of Santiago and in 2011 he was appointed archbishop of Concepción. In 2014, the archbishop was named apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Osorno. When Pope Francis named Bishop Juan Barros to head the diocese the following year, Archbishop Chomalí met with the pope to discuss the nomination because Bishop Barros was accused of covering up abuse perpetuated by the prominent Chilean Father Fernando Karadima. The pope sent a special commission to Chile in 2018 to investigate the claims of cover up and Bishop Barros resigned later that year.

Archbishop Chomalí published a pastoral letter in 2018 asking the church to fully cooperate with civil authorities in investigating abuse and condemning the role of clericalism in enabling members of the church to commit and cover up abuse.

In 2023, Pope Francis named him archbishop of Santiago, home to more than 4 million Catholics.

— Cardinal-designate Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi

Japanese Cardinal-designate Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi of Tokyo has lived and ministered in Australia and Africa, and has continued to lead on an international level as president of Caritas Internationalis and as secretary-general of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences.

Born Nov. 1, 1958, in Miyako, in the province of Iwate, he joined the Society of the Divine Word and made his solemn profession in 1985 and was ordained to the priesthood the following year. He continued his studies in Melbourne, Australia, before being sent as a missionary to Ghana for six years.

Returning to Japan in 1993, he held a variety of positions within his order, including serving as director of vocations and coordinator of the order’s justice and peace office for Asia and the Pacific. He also taught at the Verbite-run Nanzan University and served as a member of the Japanese bishops’ international aid committee.

He served as a volunteer of Caritas Japan with Rwandan refugees in Africa and as executive director of Caritas Japan from 1999-2004 and as its president from 2007-2022.

St. John Paul II named him bishop of Niigata, Japan, in 2004, and Pope Francis appointed him archbishop of Tokyo in 2017.

— Cardinal-designate Pablo Virgilio Siongco David

Cardinal-designate Pablo Virgilio David is widely known as “Bishop Ambo” in the Philippines; Ambo is a common Filipino nickname for anyone named Pablo but he told Radio Veritas in 2022, “I started to like my nickname because it is associated with the stance from which the word of God is proclaimed” in a church.

A biblical scholar, the bishop became particularly well known for opposing the way former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and his supporters carried out their “war on drugs,” which human rights organisations denounced as unleashing thousands of extrajudicial killings — targeting drug users instead of those selling, trafficking or profiting from drug sales.

As he told Radio Veritas, “The Department of Justice threatened to sue me for obstruction of justice,” for denouncing the program, “and then, later on, I received five criminal charges from the Philippine National Police.” The charges were later dropped, but the drug rehabilitation program his diocese started then continues, as does its mental health program.

Born March 2, 1959, in Betis, which is in the Archdiocese of San Fernando, he attended Mother of Good Counsel Minor Seminary in San Fernando before enrolling at the Ateneo de Manila University where he earned his master’s degree in theology from the Ateneo’s Loyola School of Theology. He earned a licentiate and doctorate from KU Leuven, a Catholic university in Belgium, and also studied at the École Biblique et Archéologique Française in Jerusalem.

After teaching in the San Fernando seminary, he was named an auxiliary bishop of San Fernando by Pope Benedict XVI in 2006. Pope Francis named him bishop of Kalookan in 2015. In 2021 he was elected president of the bishops’ conference of the Philippines and in February he was elected vice president of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences.

— Cardinal-designate Ladislav Nemet

Cardinal-designate Ladislav Nemet was born in the former Yugoslavia, prepared for the priesthood in Poland, was a university chaplain in the Philippines, taught in Austria and served as general secretary of the Hungarian bishops’ conference.

A polyglot, he speaks Serbian, Hungarian, English, German, Polish, Italian and Croatian.

Born Sept. 7, 1956, in Odzaci, Serbia, which was then part of Yugoslavia, he attended the diocesan high school before entering the Society of the Divine Word and being sent to Poland for his philosophy and theology studies. He made his perpetual vows in 1982 and was ordained to the priesthood in 1983.

After earning a doctorate in dogmatic theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, he was sent as a missionary to the Philippines and served as chaplain at the University of San Carlos in Cebu City. In 1994, he was sent to Austria where he was a professor of theology in Mödling and assistant at a nearby parish. He worked with the Holy See mission to U.N. agencies in Vienna from 2000 to 2004 and taught theology in Zagreb.

The future cardinal served as provincial of the Society of the Divine Word’s Hungarian province from 2004-2007. During his term, also served as secretary-general of the Hungarian bishops’ conference and taught missiology at the Sapientia School of Theology in Budapest.

Pope Benedict XVI named him bishop of Zrenjanin, Serbia, in 2008. Since 2016, he has been president of the International Bishops’ Conference of Sts. Cyril and Methodius, which includes the Catholic bishops of Serbia, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Montenegro. Pope Francis named him archbishop of Belgrade in 2022.

— Cardinal-designate Jaime Spengler

Cardinal-designate Jaime Spengler is not only the leader of an archdiocese with more than 2.4 million Catholics, but he is also president of the largest episcopate in the world and president of a continent-wide council of 22 episcopal conferences.

The 64-year-old archbishop of Porto Alegre, located at the southernmost tip of Brazil, was elected president of the Brazilian bishops’ conference in April 2023, after serving as its vice president, and then, less than a month later, elected president of the Latin American bishops’ council, known as CELAM, for a four-year term until 2027.

The member of the Order of Friars Minor has said he ascribes to a Franciscan style of evangelisation — proclaiming the Gospel with one’s life lived simply and with joy — and a synodal style of leadership.

Born in Gaspar, Brazil, Sept. 6, 1960, he took his solemn vows as a Franciscan in 1985 and became a priest in 1990.

He studied at the Franciscan’s Pontifical Antonianum University in Rome and returned to Brazil where his assignments including being a parish priest and serving as a professor and vice-rector of the São Boaventura Institute of Philosophy at Campo Largo.

Pope Benedict XVI appointed him auxiliary bishop of Porto Alegre in 2010, and he was named its archbishop in 2013 by Pope Francis.

Cardinal-designate Spengler attended both sessions of the synod on synodality, and told reporters on Oct. 8, 2024, that he did not know what would be “the best solution to the priest shortage, but we need frankness and openness to address it.”

“In some areas of the Amazon, there are communities of faithful who have to wait months or even years to be able to celebrate the Eucharist,” he said. In his archdiocese, “we are investing in permanent deacons: perhaps in the future these married men can also be ordained as presbyters for a specific community.”

— Cardinal-designate Ignace Bessi Dogbo

Cardinal-designate Ignace Bessi Dogbo was installed as the archbishop of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, only two months before Pope Francis announced he would make the 63-year-old a cardinal.

Two days before his installation in Abidjan Aug. 3, he told Vatican News that becoming the archbishop made him “tremble” because the archdiocese “makes up half of the church in Ivory Coast, with over 2 million faithful.”

He was born Aug. 17, 1961, in Niangon-Adjamé on the northern edge of Abidjan, studied in the Ivory Coast and was ordained to the priesthood Aug. 2, 1987, for the Diocese of Yopougon. He ministered for two years in parishes before being sent to Rome where he earned a licentiate in exegesis from the Pontifical Biblical Institute in 1993.

Returning to Yopougon, he served as diocesan director of the pontifical mission societies and later as vicar general of the diocese. From 1997 to 2004, he was pastor of the Yopougon cathedral and a professor of biblical languages at St. Paul Seminary in Abidjan.

In 2004, St. John Paul II named him bishop of Katiola, in the centre of the country. He was elected president of the bishops’ conference of the Ivory Coast in 2017 and served in that role until 2023.

From 2021 to 2024, he served as archbishop of Korhogo, and Pope Francis named him archbishop of Abidjan in May.

— Cardinal-designate Jean-Paul Vesco

A former lawyer and an avid runner, Cardinal-designate Jean-Paul Vesco considers himself a bridge-builder, particularly between the Catholic and Muslim worlds.

After being elevated to the College of Cardinals by Pope Francis on Dec. 7, his role as archbishop of Algiers, Algeria, will have “an even stronger connection with Rome,” he told Vatican News on Oct. 6. “Being named a cardinal by the pope is a sign given for us, for our Muslim brothers and sisters.”

Born in Lyon, France, on March 10, 1962, he studied law and worked as a business lawyer until he felt a call to the priesthood after attending an ordination Mass. He joined the Dominican order, professed his vows at the age of 34 in 1996 and was ordained to the priesthood in 2001.

After studying at the École Biblique in Jerusalem from 2001 to 2002, he moved to the Dominican convent of Tlemcen, Algeria, to reestablish the presence of the Dominicans in the Diocese of Oran six years after the assassination of its bishop, Blessed Pierre Claverie.

“It’s precisely because of his assassination that I find myself in Algeria,” he told Vatican News.

While serving as bishop of Oran, Cardinal-designate Vesco organised the beatification ceremony of his predecessor and fellow Dominican, Blessed Claverie. The martyr was beatified in 2018 in the city where he was assassinated by a car bomb in 1996. He was beatified along with the seven Trappist monks of Tibhirine and 11 religious men and women martyred between 1994 and 1996 during the Algerian Civil War.

Although elected superior of the Dominican community at Tlemcen in 2010, he returned to France in early 2011 when he was elected prior provincial of the Province of France.

Nearly two years later, Pope Benedict XVI appointed him bishop of Oran, which he led from 2013 until 2022 when Pope Francis named him archbishop of Algiers.

— Cardinal-designate Dominique Joseph Mathieu

Cardinal-designate Dominique Joseph Mathieu grew up in a Muslim neighbourhood in Belgium and lived for a time in Lebanon, discovering that the best kind of interreligious dialogue is people of different faiths coming together over common concerns like poverty and the environment.

“Where ‘theological dialogue’ may be perceived as ‘weakness,’ there are points of encounter and discussion in issues like those touched upon by the pope in “Fratelli tutti,’ in our common home, in the cry of the poor, in ecology,” he told AsiaNews Oct. 22. “We can find fertile ground because it is a concern for the Muslim world as well.”

Fluent in Italian, English, French and Arabic, the 61-year-old archbishop of Tehran and Isfahan, Iran, has been leading the sole Latin-rite Catholic diocese in the Islamic Republic since 2021. He will become the first cardinal ministering in Iran.

Born June 13, 1963, in Arlon, Belgium, the cardinal-designate joined the Conventual Franciscans and professed his vows in 1987. He was ordained a priest in 1989.

He has held many positions within his Franciscan order, including serving as provincial minister of the Belgian province and rector of the national shrine of St. Anthony of Padua in Brussels, which is “a place of sharing and dialogue between Christians and Muslims, lay people and other social and religious minorities,” according to the order’s website, ofmconv.net.

After serving as president of the Central Europe Federation of the Friars Minor Conventual, he moved to Lebanon in 2013 and was incardinated in the Custody of the Orient and the Holy Land where he served as secretary, formator, novice master and rector of postulants and candidates.

He was definitor general of the order and assistant general for the Central Europe Federation from 2019 to 2021 when Pope Francis named him archbishop of the Archdiocese of Teheran and Ispahan, which had been vacant since 2015.

— Cardinal-designate Roberto Repole

Archbishop Roberto Repole of Turin, Italy, will be the first cardinal from Turin, in northern Italy, since 2010.

The archbishop was born in Turin on Jan. 29, 1967, and entered the minor seminary at the age of 11. After philosophy and theology studies at the Turin Archdiocesan Seminary, he was ordained a priest in 1992. He later earned a licentiate and doctorate in theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. A longtime lecturer in systematic theology at the Theological Faculty of Turin and the Higher Institute of Religious Sciences in Turin, he became president of the Italian Theological Association in 2011.

The archbishop has published essays on the role of the church in the age of postmodernism and secularisation and has edited a multivolume collection of essays on the theology of Pope Francis.

Pope Francis named him archbishop of Turin in 2022, the first native priest of Turin to become archbishop of the city since 1897. Simultaneously, he was named bishop of the neighbouring diocese of Susa, uniting the two dioceses in the person of the bishop. He was one of the Italian delegates to the Synod of Bishops on synodality in 2023 and 2024.

The archbishop has spoken publicly on synodality and has said the church needs to develop ministries “other than the ordained ministry” to engage laypeople in the life of the church.

— Cardinal-designate Baldassare Reina

When Pope Francis announced he would make Rome Auxiliary Bishop Baldassare Reina a cardinal, he also announced that the cardinal-designate would be his new vicar for the Diocese of Rome. And, several days later, he formally appointed him archpriest of the Basilica of St. John Lateran, the cathedral of the diocese.

Known as “Baldo” since early childhood and still as bishop, he was born in the small Sicilian town of San Giovanni Gemini Nov. 26, 1970. He did his middle school and high school studies at the Agrigento archdiocesan seminary, starting at the age of 11.

Sent to Rome, he studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University, earning a bachelor’s degree in theology in 1995 and was ordained to the priesthood. He earned a licentiate in biblical theology, also from the Gregorian, in 1998.

For the next 20 years, he alternated service at the Agrigento seminary and in parishes. For three years, he was vice-rector of the seminary and diocesan assistant to the parish-based Catholic Action groups. From 2001 to 2003, he was pastor of Blessed Virgin Mary of Itria Parish in Favara, and then for six years he served as prefect for studies at the seminary’s St. Gregory of Agrigento theological school. In 2009, he began four years of service as pastor of St. Leo Parish in Agrigento. From 2013 to 2022, he served as rector of the seminary.

In the spring of 2022, he was sent to work at the Vatican, in the then-Congregation for Clergy, but was there for less than a month when the Vatican announced Pope Francis was making him an auxiliary bishop of Rome. Six months later, in January 2023, the pope named him vice-regent of the diocese.

— Cardinal-designate Francis Leo

In just two years, Cardinal-designate Francis Leo has gone from being a priest and vicar general of the Archdiocese of Montréal to becoming a cardinal.

And in that time, nothing was as fast as his being ordained auxiliary bishop of Montréal in 2022 and then being named archbishop of Toronto, Canada’s largest archdiocese, just five months later.

Now, just 21 months after his installation in Toronto, the 53-year-old native of Montréal will be elevated to the College of Cardinals on Dec. 7, giving Canada its fifth living cardinal and fourth cardinal-elector.

Born June 30, 1971, to Italian immigrant parents, Cardinal-designate Leo knew at a young age he wanted to be a priest. He entered the Grand Séminaire de Montréal in 1990 and was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Montréal in 1996.

In 2006, he was invited to study at the Vatican’s school for diplomatic service. He served briefly at the Holy See’s mission in Bangkok, Thailand, then served in the nunciature in Australia from 2008 to 2011.

He also served from 2011 to 2012 at the Holy See’s study mission in Hong Kong, which gave him a “glimpse into the difficulties, the challenges of being Christian in China” as well as the people’s dedication to the faith despite the persecution, he told America Magazine in 2023.

With advanced degrees in canon law, diplomacy and international law, a doctorate in systematic theology specialising in Mariology, and studies in spiritual direction, the cardinal-designate returned to Montréal to teach at the seminary. He also founded the Canadian Mariological Society in 2015.

The cardinal-designate, who speaks English, French, Italian and Spanish, has taught theology, spirituality and philosophy in several countries, including Canada, Australia and the United States.

— Cardinal-designate Rolandas Makrickas

Lithuanian Archbishop Rolandas Makrickas is a longtime Vatican diplomat tapped by the pope to serve as coadjutor archpriest of the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome.

He was born on Jan. 31, 1972, in Biržai in Soviet Lithuania. In a 2023 interview with Šiaures Rytai, the town newspaper, Archbishop Makrickas said he was born in a rectory that had been confiscated by the communist government and turned into a maternity home.

“After the restoration of independence, the building was returned to the church,” he said. “Now, when I return to Biržai, I visit both the parish priest and my birthplace together. So, I came into the world in a rectory, and I didn’t go far,” he said, laughing.

He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Panevežys in 1996 and received a doctorate in church history from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome in 2004.

After entering the Vatican diplomatic service in 2006, he served at nunciatures in the Caucasus — Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan — and in Sweden before being assigned to the nunciature in Washington from 2013 to 2017 where he was involved in organising Pope Francis’ visit to the United States in 2015. After a short stint at the nunciature in Gabon, he was assigned to the Vatican Secretariat of State in 2019.

In 2021, he was appointed an official of the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome, a church with special significance to Pope Francis. Before and after each of his trips, the pope prays before the basilica’s Marian icon of “Salus Populi Romani” (“health of the Roman people”), and he has said he will be buried there instead of in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican.

In 2023, Pope Francis gave the Lithuanian prelate the title of archbishop and in March named him coadjutor archpriest of the basilica.

— Cardinal-designate Mykola Bychok

Just 11 months shy of being the first millennial cardinal, Cardinal-designate Mykola Bychok will be the youngest member of the College of Cardinals after Dec. 7 — he is 44 years old.

Born in Ternopil, Ukraine, on Feb. 13, 1980, the prelate will also be the only living cardinal of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, which is headed by Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of Kyiv-Halych, 54.

“Our church rejoices because it will have another bishop who, in addition to the head of the church, will competently speak to the pope and stand up for the protection of our church and the people of Ukraine,” Archbishop Shevchuk said after the pope announced the list of new cardinals.

Cardinal-designate Bychok has been leading the Eparchy of Sts. Peter and Paul of Melbourne, Australia, since 2021. Before that appointment, he served at St. John the Baptist Ukrainian Catholic parish in Newark, New Jersey, since 2015.

He told Vatican News Oct. 17 that, based on his background and experience, his two main priorities are peacemaking and evangelisation.

Peace and the sacraments are linked, he said, because “peace in the world will only come when people have peace in their hearts, a true peace that comes from the love of Christ.”

Cardinal-designate Bychok entered the Redemptorist order in 1997 and was ordained to the priesthood in Lviv in 2005.

He served as a missionary in Siberia from 2005 to 2007 and then returned to Ukraine to do youth ministry in Ivano-Frankivsk in western Ukraine.

He served as the rector of the monastery of St. Joseph and the rector of the parish of the Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Ivano-Frankivsk from 2008 to 2010, and then served as treasurer of the Lviv Redemptorist Province until late 2014.

He was assisting at monasteries in Lviv and Ivano-Frankivsk in early 2015 when he was sent to Newark to serve as vicar of the Ukrainian Catholic parish there.

— Cardinal-designate Timothy Radcliffe

At least for English-speakers, Cardinal-designate Timothy Radcliffe, 79, is arguably the best known of the newest group of cardinals, mainly because of his nine years as master general of the Dominican order, his public preaching and his frequent publications as a theologian.

When Pope Francis announced he would induct him into the College of Cardinals, the British Dominican was serving his second term as spiritual adviser to members of the Synod of Bishops on synodality and had led retreats for synod members before the assemblies began.

Born Aug. 22, 1945, in London, as a boy he was a boarding student at the Benedictine-run Worth Preparatory School and Downside School before enrolling at Oxford University’s St. John’s College.

Attracted to religious life, he said he was taken by the Dominican’s motto, “Veritas,” which means truth. He entered the Dominicans, formally the Order of Preachers, in 1965 after studying at Oxford University’s St. John’s College. He was ordained to the priesthood in 1971 and has been active in the British peace movement and involved in the pastoral care to people with AIDS.

While teaching Scripture at the Dominicans’ Blackfriars Hall, he was elected head of the Dominicans’ English province in 1988 and was elected as the first English master of the Dominicans in 1992. After completing his nine-year term, he returned to Oxford.

The Dominicans at Blackfriars launched the Las Casas Institute in 2008 to promote the study of Catholic social doctrine and the intersection of theology and social problems. Father Radcliffe served as a member of the advisory board and was director from 2014 to 2016. He also has served as a member of the theological commission of Caritas Internationalis, the global network of national Catholic charities.

— Cardinal-designate Fabio Baggio

Cardinal-designate Fabio Baggio’s work in the Roman Curia encompasses three areas of significant and connected concern for Pope Francis: the pastoral care of migrants and refugees, integral human development and care for all of creation.

Pope Francis first appointed the 59-year-old Scalabrinian missionary to the Roman Curia in 2017 with then-Jesuit Father Jesuit Michael Czerny to be his “direct collaborators” as undersecretaries of a specially created section for refugees and migrants in the integral human development dicastery.

Cardinal Czerny, prefect of the dicastery, will ordain him a bishop on Jan. 11, 2025, in the chapel of the Scalabrini Missionary Center in Bassano del Grappa, Italy.

Cardinal-designate Baggio was appointed undersecretary of the dicastery in 2022 and, also serves as director of the Laudato Si’ Centre for Higher Education and Borgo Laudato Si’ at the papal summer villa, gardens and farm in Castel Gandolfo.

Born Jan. 15, 1965, in Bassano del Grappa, in 1976 the cardinal-designate joined the Scalabrinians, an order of priests and religious serving migrants and refugees in 35 countries.

He professed his final vows in 1991 and was ordained a priest together with his brother, Gianantonio, in 1992. He earned several degrees at Rome’s Pontifical Gregorian University, including a doctorate in church history.

He moved to Chile where he served as assistant parish priest in Santiago and an adviser to the Chilean Episcopal Commission for Migration from 1995 to 1997.

He then went to Argentina where he was director of the department of migration of the Archdiocese of Buenos Aires from 1997 to 2002 and was national secretary of the Pontifical Mission Societies of Argentina.

The missionary spent a few months in Sydney, Australia, ministering to Italian and Latin American immigrants before moving to the Philippines where he was director of the Scalabrini Migration Centre in Quezon City and editor of the Asian and Pacific Migration Journal from 2002 to 2010.

— Cardinal-designate George Jacob Koovakad

Cardinal-designate George J. Koovakad, 51, is a Syro-Malabar Catholic priest responsible for organising the pope’s international trips.

Born in Chethipuzha in India’s southern Kerala state Aug. 11, 1973, he — like Pope Francis — studied chemistry before entering the seminary. He was ordained a priest of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Archeparchy of Changanacherry in 2004.

The cardinal-designate received a doctorate in canon law from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome in 2006 and joined the Holy See’s diplomatic service that same year. He worked in Vatican nunciatures in Algeria, South Korea, Iran, Costa Rica and Venezuela.

In 2020, Msgr. Koovakad began working in the General Affairs Section of the Vatican Secretariat of State. During the pope’s trip to Hungary and Slovakia in September 2021, Pope Francis announced Msgr. Koovakad would become the organiser of papal trips, noting that he “always smiles.” In that role, the monsignor has organized a dozen papal trips, including to Canada in 2022, to Congo and South Sudan in 2023 and the September trip to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste and Singapore — the longest trip of Pope Francis’ pontificate.

He will be among the youngest members of the College of Cardinals, but it is not certain that he will remain the papal trip organiser.

St. John Paul II named two organisers of papal trips as cardinals: Cardinal Roberto Tucci, the longtime organiser his international trips; and Cardinal Jacques-Paul Martin, who helped organise St. Paul VI’s trip to the Holy Land in 1964. Neither were made cardinals while still in their positions.

— Cardinal-designate Domenico Battaglia

Cardinal-designate Domenico Battaglia, who said on Nov. 4 that he prefers to still be referred to as “Don Mimmo” — not “His Eminence” — after receiving his red hat, is a prelate known for rallying help for people on the margins of society, particularly people struggling with addiction.

Born Jan. 20, 1963, in the Calabrian town of Satriano, he did his middle school studies at the minor seminary in Squillace before entering the high school seminary in Catanzaro. He finished his preparation for the priesthood with studies in philosophy and theology at St. Pius X Pontifical Regional Seminary in Catanzaro and was ordained to the priesthood in 1988.

The next year, he was named rector of the high school seminary and a member of the diocesan justice and peace commission. From 1992 to 1999, he was pastor of the Parish of Our Lady of Carmine in Catanzaro and director of the diocesan office for missionary cooperation.

From 1992 to 2016 he also led the Calabrian Center of Solidarity, a therapeutic community for people fighting drug addiction and from 2006 to 2015 served as president of the Italian Federation of Therapeutic Communities.

In 2016, Pope Francis named him bishop of Cerreto Sannita-Telese-Sant’Agata de’ Goti, a ministry he continued until Pope Francis named him archbishop of Naples in 2020.

When Pope Francis announced on Oct. 6 that he would be creating new cardinals in December, he did not mention the archbishop. Instead, almost a month later, the Vatican press office put out a short note saying the pope had added him to the list.