Pope Francis created 21 new cardinals in St. Peter’s Square on September 30th. In light of the synod, the Pope said, “The College of Cardinals is called to resemble a symphony orchestra, representing the harmony and synodality of the Church.” The consistory saw cardinals created from 15 different countries, and 18 of the new cardinals are under the age of 80 and are therefore eligible to vote in a conclave.
The College of Cardinals, numbering 243 members, consists of 136 cardinal electors and 107 non-electors. Of the cardinal electors, 98 were appointed during the pontificate of Pope Francis, 29 were appointed by Pope Benedict XVI, and nine by John Paul II.
On the eve of the Synod of Synodality, Pope Francis emphasized the role of cardinals within the diverse community of the Church, continuing his analogy, “A symphony thrives on the skillful composition of the timbres of different instruments: each one makes its contribution, sometimes alone, sometimes united with someone else, sometimes with the whole ensemble. Diversity is necessary; it is indispensable. However, each sound must contribute to the common design. This is why mutual listening is essential: each musician must listen to the others.”
By the end of 2023, the number of cardinal electors will drop to 132 when Cardinals Sandri, Yeom Soo-jung, Zerbo, and Cipriani Thorne reach the age of 80. The majority of the new cardinals come from Europe. However, Pope Francis also elevated cardinals from the peripheries per his usual custom. For example, Archbishop Stephen Ameyu of South Sudan was named a cardinal. Two others also come from South Africa and Hong Kong.
His Eminence Stephen Brislin, Cardinal Archbishop of Cape Town, South Africa, reflects on the fruit of the recent consistory and the Church’s mission to evangelize, saying in an interview with EWTN Vaticano, “It’s been wonderful that the present Pope and a number of the previous Popes have really tried to emphasize that we are all meant to evangelize, and we evangelize not only by speaking to them, but particularly by how we live our lives, and how our conduct and our ethical behavior proclaim who we are and what we are.”
Similarly, the newly made Cardinal Archbishop of Hong Kong, His Eminence Stephen Chow Sau-yan, SJ, reflecting on his role as cardinal, sees the necessity of evangelization within and without parish communities. He says, “How do we accept the challenge and contribute to a better future in Hong Kong—through education, that’s one important thing, and through our formation of lay people in the parishes. I’ve been saying to them that evangelization is not just to yourselves, to the parish. Evangelization is to your social community. Each parish is connected to its social community. We need to go out, to get out of our parish, and really to connect with the social community and to serve them.”
At the consistory, in reference to the synod, the Holy Father also explained his role as Pope, using the same image of the orchestra, saying, “The conductor of the orchestra is at the service of this kind of miracle that is each performance of a symphony. He has to listen more than anyone else, and at the same time, his job is to help each person and the whole orchestra develop the greatest creative fidelity: fidelity to the work being performed, but also creative, able to give a soul to the score, to make it resonate in the here and now in a unique way.”
Edited and adapted by Jacob Stein.
