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Pope Francis appointed 13 new cardinals from all the world’s continents in the presence of Pope Benedict during a short ceremony due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
On Saturday, Pope Francis announced the names of 13 new cardinals appointed by them from all continents, thus continuing to amend the ecclesiastical hierarchy to bring it closer to its priorities, in a brief ceremony due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Since his election in 2013, the 83-year-old Argentine pope has appointed 95 of the 229 cardinals that make up the “Congregation of Cardinals,” including the thirteen new cardinals.
He named more than half of the cardinals who could vote when they were under 80 years old. And they participate exclusively with other cardinals in the election of the new Pope.
Pope Francis is interested in remote areas and small Catholic minorities. In the current pool of new cardinals, Cornelius Sim has chosen the Apostolic Vicar of the Sultanate of Brunei on the island of Borneo, which is predominantly Muslim with some 400,000 inhabitants and only 16,000 Catholics.
“It’s a hidden little church like a Fiat 500,” said Sim, 69, in an interview with “Asia News,” the first citizen of his country to become a bishop and then a cardinal.
This election confirms the importance that the Pope attaches to the Asian continent from which he elected a new Philippine cardinal, Bishop José Foyeri Adincula (68 years old).
These new cardinals from Asia have moved on from coming to the Vatican due to restrictions associated with the pandemic.
The new cardinals are six Italians, an American, a Rwandan, a Mexican, a Spanish and a Maltese, who participated in the ceremony after spending a strict period of confinement in the residence where the Pope occupies a modest apartment.
Body space
As usual, the new “princes of the Church” bowed to the Pope to get the red hat and ring in the sumptuous St. Peter’s Basilica. The color red reminds them that they must be willing to sacrifice their blood for the church.
The Pope had asked them to stay “close to the people” and not to be tempted by the new title.
The Pope called for the rejection of corruption “in all its forms” in priestly life, adding that “purple-red is the color of blood and can become, in worldly life, a color of different differentiation.”
On Saturday he abolished the tradition of exchanging a “kiss of peace” between the Pope and the new and old cardinals, as well as the tradition of “courtesy visits” that allowed the people of Rome to greet new cardinals.
The new cardinals were also prohibited from communicating with about 40 cardinals who attended the ceremony wearing masks and adhered to the rules of social distancing. Several cardinals attended the video ceremony.
Kigali Archbishop Antoine Kampandja, 62, came to Rome to become Rwanda’s first cardinal, who 26 years ago witnessed genocidal massacres, from which he personally escaped.
The 72-year-old Archbishop of Washington Wilton Gregory received the most media coverage because he was the first black American to appoint a cardinal. He told AFP that this was a sign of support for “black Americans” after denouncing last June the position of the outgoing US president, Donald Trump, on anti-racist demonstrations.
Latin America has received two new cardinals, Mexican Felipe Ersmendi Esquivel (80 years old) and Bishop Celestino Os Braco (75 years old), a Spanish Capuchin father who became Archbishop of Santiago in Chile in 2019 after the resignation of the cardinal involved. in the child abuse scandal.
Kabushi to death
Three of the new Italian cardinals are committed to helping those most in need, a theme dear to Pope Francis, who has always stressed that “the Church is a field hospital.”
Among them is the complex’s youngest cardinal, Franciscan Father Mauro Gambetti, 55, guardian of the Holy Monastery of Assisi, where the tomb of Saint Francis of Assisi is located, who took poverty and brotherhood as his focus. He had received the Jesuit Pope when he arrived in October to sign his pastoral letter “Fratelli Totti”, which was largely inspired by the Franciscans.
The pope appointed a simple parish priest in Rome, Enrico Verucci, 80, as a cardinal, pioneer of fieldwork and longtime director of Caritas’ charitable branch.
The pope also awarded the Archbishop of Siena in the Italian region of Tuscany, Monsignor Augusto Paolo Logodici, 56, for naming him cardinal. When he was in Rome prior to that, he dedicated his time to helping the marginalized and Roma, which made him claim the title of “Romani priest”.
Every new cardinal must appoint a bishop before that, if he has not yet assumed this position, except that one person requested an exception in this regard. “I wish to remain a Capuchin brother until death,” said Raniero Cantalamisa.
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