Following his Angelus address on January 4, Pope Francis announced the names of 20 prelates who will become cardinals on February 14.

“On Sunday, February 15, I will preside at a solemn concelebration with the new cardinals, while on February 12 and 13 I will hold a consistory with all the cardinals to reflect on the orientations and proposals for the reform of the Roman Curia,” he said.

Only one of the new cardinals is currently serving in the Roman Curia, and 14 are residential bishops. Pope Francis also announced that he would honor five other prelates “distinguished for their pastoral charity in the service of the Holy See and of the Church,” even though they have turned 80 and therefore ineligible to participate in a papal conclave.

The new curial cardinal is Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura.

The new cardinals who govern dioceses will be

•Archbishiop Manuel José Macario do Nascimento Clemente, Patriarch of Lisbon (Portugal)
•Archbishop Berhaneyesus Demerew Souraphiel, CM, of Addis Abeba (Ethiopia)
•Archbishop John Atcherley Dew of Wellington (New Zealand)
•Archbishop Edoardo Menichelli of Ancona-Osimo (Italy)
•Archbishop Pierre Nguyên V?n Nhon of Hanoi (Viêt Nam)
•Archbishop Alberto Suàrez Inda of Morelia (Mexico)
•Archbishop Charles Maung Bo, SDB, of Yangon (Myanmar)
•Archbishop Francis Xavier Kriengsak Kovithavanij of Bangkok (Thailand)
•Archbishop Francesco Montenegro of Agrigento (Italy)
•Archbishop Daniel Fernando Sturla Berhouet, S.D.B., of Montevideo (Uruguay)
•Archbishop Ricardo Blázquez Pérez of Vallodolid (Spain)
•Bishop José Luis Lacunza Maestrojuán, OAR, of David (Panamá)
•Bishop Arlindo Gomes Furtado of Santiago de Cabo Verde (Cape Verde)
•Bishop Soane Patita Paini Mafi of Tonga (Tonga)
“The most evident criteria is evidently that of universality,” said Father Federico Lombardi, the director of the Holy See Press Office. “Fourteen different countries are represented, including some that do not currently have a cardinal, and some that have never had one.”

“The fact that only one of the new Cardinals is from the Roman Curia is also notable, while ‘Roman’ cardinals remain about a quarter of the electors,” he added. “The new nominations confirm that the Pope is not bound to the traditions of the ‘cardinalatial sees’ – which were motivated by historical reasons in different countries – in which the cardinalate was considered almost ‘automatically’ connected to such sees.”

The five other new cardinals are


•Archbishop José de Jesús Pimiento Rodriguez, Archbishop Emeritus of Manizales (Colombia)
•Archbishop Luigi De Magistris, Major Pro-Penitentiary Emeritus
•Archbishop Karl-Joseph Rauber, Apostolic Nuncio (retired)
•Archbishop Luis Héctor Villaba, Archbishop Emeritus of Tucuмán (Argentina)
•Bishop Júlio Duarte Langa, Bishop Emeritus of Xai-Xai (Mozambique)
“They represent so many Bishops who, with the same pastoral solicitude, have given witness of love for Christ and for the people of God,” said Pope Francis.

There are currently 208 cardinals, 110 of whom are eligible to participate in a papal election. One of them, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, will turn 80 before the consistory. Another, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, who resigned in disgrace last year, chose not to participate in the papal conclave of 2013 and presumably will not take part in future conclaves.

Following the consistory, then, there will be 218 cardinals, 122 of whom will be eligible to vote in a papal election. Besides Cardinal Re, 12 other cardinals are currently 79 years old, and four are 78 – making another consistory likely in the next two years if Pope Francis wishes to maintain the number of cardinal electors at 120, the number set by Pope Paul VI.

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