Pope Francis yesterday surprisingly announced that he will create 13 new cardinals on 5 October. Surprisingly, because the numbers do not really suggest the ned for a consistory at this time. There are currently 118 electors, cardinals who are active in the Roman Curia and who can vote in a conclave to elect a new Pope, with only 8 aging out between now and the end of 2020. It is clear, however, that Pope Francis prefers having too many rather than too few cardinals, and so habitually ignores the rule that there can only be a maximum of 120 electors (he’s not the only Pope to have done so, however: Pope St. John Paul II once expanded their number to a massive 135).
And, as ever, he also aims for a representative College of Cardinals. In this round, he selects prelates from Luxembourg and Morocco, countries which have never had a cardinal before, but also more traditional cardinalatial sees such as Bologna, Havana and Kinshasa.
And again we see the fallout of recent papal visits abroad. Hence cardinals from Lithuania (visited in September of 2018) and Morocco (March 2019).
After 5 October, there will be 215 cardinals, with 128 electors. Two days later, the latter number will drop again, as Cardinal-designate Ambongo Besungu’s predecessor in Kinshasa, Cardinal Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya, reaches the age of 80.
Below a list of the new cardinals:
- Miguel Angel Ayuso Guixot (67, Spain)
- President of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and Prefect of the Commission for Religious Relations with Muslims.
- José Tolentino Medonça (53, Portugal)
- Librarian of the Vatican Apostolic Library and Archivist of the Vatican Secret Archives.
- Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo (69, Indonesia)
- Metropolitan Archbishop of Jakarta, Military Ordinary of Indonesia and President of the Episcopal Conference of Indonesia
- Juan de la Caridad Garciá Rodríguez (71, Cuba)
- Metropolitan Archbishop of La Habana
- Fridolin Ambongo Besungu (59, Democratic Republic of the Congo)
- Metropolitan Archbishop of Kinshasa and Vice-President of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo
- Metropolitan Archbishop of Kinshasa and Vice-President of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo
- Jean-Claude Hollerich (60, Luxembourg) (pictured above)
- Archbishop of Luxembourg and President of the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Community
- Alvaro Leonel Ramazzini Imeri (72, Guatemala)
- Bishop of Huehuetenango
- Matteo Zuppi (63, Italy)
(pictured at left giving a homily at the Church of the Frisians in Rome in 2015)
- Metropolitan Archbishop of Bologna
- Cristóbal López Romero (67, Morocco)
- Archbishop of Rabat
- Michael Czerny (73, Canada)
- Undersecretary of the Migrant and Refugee Section of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development
- Michael Louis Fitzgerald (82, United Kingdom)
- Apostolic Nuncio emeritus to Egypt and Delegate emeritus to the League of Arab States
- Sigitas Tamkevicius (80, Lithuania)
- Metropolitan Archbishop emeritus of Kaunas
- Eugenio Dal Corso (80, Angola)
- Bishop emeritus of Benguela
Of these, cardinals-designate Fitzgerald, Tamkevicius and Dal Corso, being 80 or older, are ineligible to participate in a conclave. Their selection must therefore be seen as a recognition for their work for the Church and the people in their pastoral care.
Cardinal-designate Czerny is also the first elector who is not yet a bishop upon his selection. Priests who are not (yet) bishops can be made cardinals, but this usually only happens for non-electors. As a Jesuit, Msgr. Czerny will probably request dispensation to not be ordained as a bishop before his creation as cardinal. This is par of the course for Jesuits who are not yet made bishops for other reasons (such as Pope Francis, who was ordained a bishop in 1992 to serve as auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires).
The decision was not unexpected, but it may have important repercussions for the future work of the Council of Cardinals as well as for Pope Francis’ efforts to reform the Curia. In September, the nine-member Council had requested the pope to reflect on “the work, structure and composition of the Council itself, also taking into account the advanced age of some members”, as today’s 
The three cardinals are all of advanced age, with Cardinal Pell being the youngest at 77. In fact, only for Cardinal Monsengwo Pasinya would age have been the sole reason to be let go from the Council. In February, the 79-year-old Congolese prelate had a coadjutor archbishop appointed to assist him in his Archdiocese of Kinshasa. In November this coadjutor, Archbishop Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, took over as archbishop of Kinshasa and Cardinal Monsengwo Pasinya retired. The letting go of Cardinals Pell and Errázuriz ,, although in part motivated by their age, is also coloured by their involvement in sexual abuse cases, with Cardinal Errázuriz playing a role in the abuse crisis in Chile and Cardinal Pell currently on trial in his native Australia.
In Caelo et in Terra 