Cardinal Filipe Neri Ferro, archbishop of Goa-Daman, has been elected the president of the Federation of Asian Ca-tholic Bishops’ Conferences (FABC).
He will succeed Salesian Cardinal Charles Muang Bo, the head of the Catholic Church in Myanmar, in January 2025, when he completes his three-year term as the head of the Asian Church.
The election took place February 22, the last day of FABC Central Committee’s three-day meeting at Bangkok, capital of Thailand.
The meeting also elected Bishop Pablo Virgilio Siongco David of Kalookan, Philippines, as the vice president. He will succeed Cardinal Malcolm Ranjit, archbishop of Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Salesian Archbishop Tarci-sio Isao Kilkuchi of Tokyo, Japan, has been reelected for a second term as the federation secretary general.
Cardinal Ferrao is currently the president of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI), the national body of the Latin rite prelates in the country.
After completing minor seminary at Our Lady, Saligao-Pilerne, Goa, he studied philo-sophy and theology at the Papal Seminary, Pune, Maharashtra. He was ordained a priest on October 28, 1979.