Pope creates 21 new cardinals from around the world

VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis on Sunday announced the creation of 21 new cardinals to represent the Catholic faith´s worldwide reach, who will be nominated at a council held on December 8.

Five of the new cardinals come from the Argentine pontiff´s native Latin America while countries including Indonesia, Japan, Serbia, the Philippines and India will also be represented, according to a list published by the Vatican.

“I am pleased to announce to you that on December 8 I will hold a consistory for the nomination of new cardinals,” the pope declared as he delivered his Angelus prayer on St Peter´s Square.

“Their provenance expresses the universality of the Church and manifests the indissoluble bond between the seat of St Peter and the wider Churches of the world,” the 87-year-old added.

Italy will nonetheless take the lion´s share with four new cardinals, although only three will be able to vote in elections for Francis´s successor as the fourth has already passed the age limit for papal ballot eligibility.

At 44 years of age, Mykola Bychok, the Ukrainian current archbishop of Melbourne in Australia, is the youngest to be tapped for the high clerical mantle.

Church law technically limits the number of elector cardinals to 120, but recent popes have frequently gone above that number. Fourteen cardinals will turn 80 during 2025, including one named on Sunday.

Francis has consistently named cardinal electors from countries far from Rome, giving less importance than his predecessors to European nations.