Higher Representation of African, Asian Prelates on Synod of Bishops’ Ordinary Council
Names of the enlarged group of 16 elected members include Cardinals Joseph Tobin, Luis Antonio Tagle and Cameroon Bishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya.
The sixteen prelates elected on Friday as members of the Ordinary Council of the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops — an influential group responsible for the preparation of the next synod — include some well-known names and a larger representation from Africa and Asia than in the past.
The Register has learned the Council, whose total number of members has been enlarged from 15 to 21, includes eight from Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Among those elected are Cardinals Joseph Tobin of Newark, despite not being present at this synod, Maung Bo of Yangon, Myanmar, and Bishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya of Mamfe, Cameroon — a rising star whose clear defense of the Church’s teaching during this synod has caught many people’s attention.
The remaining six members who include papal appointees, experts and dicastery heads are not yet known.
The full list of elected names:
Africa:
Cardinal Dieudonné Nzapalainga, Archbishop of Bangui, Central African Republic
Archbishop Gabriel Mblingi, Archbishop of Lubango, Angola
Bishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya of Mamfe, Cameroon
Middle East:
Syriac Patriarch Ignace Joseph III Younan of Antioch and all the East
Latin America:
Bishop Jaime Calderón of Tapachula, Mexico
Cardinal Sergio da Rocha of Brasilia, Brazil
Cardinal Daniel Fernando Sturla Berthouet of Montevideo, Uruguay
North America:
Cardinal Gerald Lacroix of Quebec, Canada
Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark
Asia:
Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila, Philippines
Cardinal Oswald Gracias of Mumbia, India
Cardinal Maung Bo of Yangon, Myanmar
Europe:
Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn of Vienna, Austria
Archbishop Matteo Zuppi of Bologna, Italy
Cardinal Juan José Omella of Barcelona, Spain
Oceania:
Archbishop Anthony Fisher of Sydney, Australia
This article has been corrected to show that Cardinal Daniel Fernando Sturla Berthouet of Montevideo, Uruguay is one of the three representatives from Latin America on the Ordinary Council.
Edward Pentin Edward Pentin is the Register’s Senior Contributor and EWTN News Vatican Analyst. He began reporting on the Pope and the Vatican with Vatican Radio before moving on to become the Rome correspondent for EWTN's National Catholic Register. He has also reported on the Holy See and the Catholic Church for a number of other publications including Newsweek, Newsmax, Zenit, The Catholic Herald, and The Holy Land Review, a Franciscan publication specializing in the Church and the Middle East. Edward is the author of The Next Pope: The Leading Cardinal Candidates (Sophia Institute Press, 2020) and The Rigging of a Vatican Synod? An Investigation into Alleged Manipulation at the Extraordinary Synod on the Family (Ignatius Press, 2015). Follow him on Twitter at @edwardpentin.
