Pope Francis announced he would make 14 new cardinals June 29, giving the red cardinal’s hat to the papal almoner, the Iraq-based patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church and the arch-bishop of Karachi, Pakistan, among others.
Announcing his choices May 20, the Pope said that coming from 11 nations, the new cardi-nals “express the universality of the church, which continues to proclaim the merciful love of God to all people of the earth.”
Pope Francis’ list included three men over the age of 80 “who have distinguished them-selves for their service to the church.”
When the Pope made the announcement, the College of Cardinals had 213 members, 115 of whom were under the age of 80 and therefore eligible to vote in a conclave to elect a new Pope. Cardinal Angelo Amato, prefect of the Congregation for Saints’ Causes, was to celebrate his 80th birthday on June 8. The new cardi-nals hail from: Iraq, Spain, Italy, Poland, Pakistan, Portugal, Peru, Madagascar, Japan, Mexico and Bolivia.
