Pope to appoint new cardinals to choose his successor

• Pope Francis’ successor
• Cardinals to choose new Pope
• Pope Francis to leave his imprint on the papacy

Pope Francis said on Sunday that he will name 21 new cardinals from around the world by the end of September in order to leave his mark on the papacy.

The upcoming consistory of cardinals, slated for September 30, will be the eighth for Pope Francis, 86, who became pope a decade ago and is eager to leave a permanent imprint on the institution.

“Their provenance expresses the universality of the Church that continues to proclaim God’s merciful love to all people on earth,” said the pope, following his weekly Sunday Angelus prayer from the window of the Apostolic Palace on Saint Peter’s Square.

Francis’ fresh picks are being keenly scrutinised as a sign of the Catholic Church’s future direction and goals for the 1.3 billion faithful.

All cardinals under the age of 80, including the 18 selected on Sunday, are known as “cardinal electors” and will vote to choose Pope Francis’ successor.

Following the consistory in late September, there will be 137 cardinal electors, with Francis appointing roughly three-quarters of them.

As part of his general ideology of diversity and inclusion, Francis has attempted to elevate clergy from poor nations far from Rome to the highest ranks of the Church since becoming Pope.

The choices named by Francis on Sunday include clergy from expanding Christian regions such as Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

Archbishops of Juba, South Sudan, Cape Town, South Africa, and Tabora, Tanzania have all been elevated to the rank of cardinal.

The list also includes the bishop from Penang, Malaysia, and that of Hong Kong, Stephen Chow Sau-Yan, who has a Harvard PhD in psychology and will be key in improving the Church’s fraught ties with communist China.

The Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, the top Catholic in the Holy Land, Italy’s Pierbattista Pizzaballa, whose archdiocese encompasses Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan and Cyprus, also will be inducted.

– Missionaries and administrators –

Francis is also tapping the heads of key dicasteries, including the Italian Claudio Gugerotti, currently prefect for the Dicastery of the Eastern Churches, and Argentina’s Victor Manuel Fernandez, chosen earlier this month by the pope to head the powerful Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

The Chicago-born head of the Dicastery for Bishops, Robert Prevost, who is charged with overseeing bishop appointments and a longtime missionary in Peru, was also named, as was the Holy See’s apostolic nuncio, or diplomat, to the United States, Christophe Pierre from France, who has also served as envoy in Haiti, Uganda and Mexico.

Included from Latin America is the emeritus archbishop of Cumana, Venezuela, the archbishop of Cordoba in Argentina, and a 96-year-old Capuchin priest from Buenos Aires.

The last consistory was held in August 2022, when Francis inducted 20 cardinals.

Cardinals, who wear the scarlet robes of their office, serve as the pope’s top advisers and administrators.

During the consistory, the future cardinals kneel one by one at the feet of the pope, who places on their heads the quadrangular scarlet cap, or biretta.

Following the ceremony, the Vatican holds a traditional “courtesy visit”, in which the new cardinals greet the general public.