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Archbishop Robert Prevost and Archbishop Christophe Pierre were among the 21 named cardinals by Pope Francis on Sunday, July 9, 2023. / Frayjhonattan, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons/L’Osservatore Romano
Washington D.C., Jul 10, 2023 / 15:20 pm (CNA).
Pope Francis named 21 new cardinals Sunday, two of whom, Archbishop Robert Prevost and Archbishop Christophe Pierre, have deep ties to the Church in the United States.
The president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Archbishop Timothy Broglio of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA, responded to the pope’s announcement in a Sunday statement, calling on the faithful to pray for the American Church’s newest cardinals.
“Please join me in praying for Cardinal-designate Prevost and Cardinal-designate Pierre as they continue their lives of service to the universal Church,” Broglio said.
Broglio added that “for the Church in the United States, their ministry has been a true blessing. Our episcopal conference rejoices in this sign of recognition of these distinguished Churchmen.”
Prevost and Pierre will be formally elevated to the rank of cardinal, the highest position in the Church besides the pope, on Sept. 30.
Archbishop Robert Prevost, 67, is the new head of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Bishops, an influential position responsible for recommending new bishops to the pope.
Born in Chicago, Prevost graduated with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Pennsylvania’s Villanova University in 1977. That same year he joined the Order of St. Augustine, also known as the Augustinians, making his solemn vows in 1981. He earned a master’s of divinity degree from Chicago’s Catholic Theological Union in 1982 and was ordained an Augustinian priest that same year. After being ordained, Prevost earned a doctorate in canon law from Rome’s Pontifical College of St. Thomas Aquinas in 1987.
He returned to Chicago for a short time in 1987, serving as pastor for vocations and director of missions for the Augustinian Province of Chicago. Prevost was then sent to Peru, where he served the Augustinians in various capacities including as a regional ecclesiastical judge and teacher of canon law in the diocesan seminary for Trujillo, Peru, for 10 years.
After being elected the head of the Augustinian Province of Chicago, Prevost returned to the U.S. in 1999. He was elected prior general of the Augustinians in 2001 and then reelected in 2007, serving as head of the order until 2013.
Pope Francis appointed Prevost as apostolic administrator of Chiclayo, Peru, in 2014, and he was ordained titular bishop of Sufar that same year.
While serving the Church in Peru, Francis made Prevost a member of the Dicastery for the Clergy in 2019 and then a member of the Dicastery for Bishops in 2020. On Jan. 30, Francis made Prevost prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, a position he took up succeeding Cardinal Marc Ouellet on April 12.
Archbishop Christophe Pierre, 77, is the current apostolic nuncio to the United States, a position in which he serves as the Holy See’s representative to America. Pierre has extensive experience in the Church’s diplomatic corps and can speak French, English, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese.
Born in Rennes, in northwestern France, Pierre attended school in Antisirabé, Madagascar, Saint-Malo, France, and Marrakesh, Morocco. He entered the seminary in Rennes in 1963. His time at the seminary was interrupted by two years of service in the French military, 1965-1966. After returning to the seminary, he was ordained a priest in 1970.
Pierre earned a master’s degree in sacred theology from the Catholic University of Paris in 1971 and a doctorate in canon law from the Pontifical Lateran University in 1977.
After studying at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy in Rome, Pierre went on to serve the Church as a diplomatic representative to New Zealand and the islands of the Pacific Ocean (1977–1981), Mozambique (1981), Zimbabwe (1982–1986), Cuba (1986–1989), Brazil (1989–1991), and as the Holy See’s permanent observer to the United Nations in Geneva (1991–1995).
In 1995, Pierre was ordained a bishop in Saint-Malo, France. Pope John Paul II appointed him as the apostolic nuncio to Haiti, a position he held from 1995 to 1999. He then served as the apostolic nuncio to Uganda (1999–2007) and then to Mexico (2007–2016).
After the retirement of Archbishop Carlo Viganò, Pope Francis appointed Pierre apostolic nuncio to the United States on April 12, 2016.
Cardinal Reinhard Marx meets with a delegation from the Italian village of Filetto di Camarda in his residence in Munich on July 9, 2023. / Credit: EOM/Robert Kiderle
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Denver, Colo., Jul 10, 2023 / 08:44 am (CNA).
The U.S. bishops have reaffirmed the importance of education access for marginalized racial groups after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against affirmative action in higher education.
“Education is a gift, an opportunity, and an important aspect of our democracy that is not always within the reach of all, especially racial and ethnic groups who find themselves on the margins,” Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Perry of Chicago, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee Against Racism, said in a July 7 statement. “It is our hope that our Catholic institutions of higher learning will continue to find ways to make education possible and affordable for everyone, regardless of their background.”
Perry cited St. Katharine Drexel, a pioneer of Catholic education: “If we wish to serve God and love our neighbor as well, we must manifest our joy in the service we render to him and them. Let us open wide our hearts. It is joy which invites us. Press forward and fear nothing,” Drexel said.
Perry noted Drexel was quoted in the title of the U.S. bishops’ 2018 pastoral letter “Open Wide Our Hearts: The Enduring Call to Love.”
The June 29 U.S. Supreme Court decision Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard concerned the affirmative action programs at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina.
However, the decision will impact all universities across the country, including Catholic institutions.
In the 6-3 decision, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the nation’s highest court effectively struck down public and private universities’ ability to include race-based affirmative action in their admissions decisions.
For decades, many universities have used affirmative action in their admissions programs to increase minority representation on their campuses. However, some have argued that affirmative action promotes the admission of certain ethnic minorities at the expense of others, often negatively impacting Asian students.
In the ruling, Roberts wrote that “Harvard’s consideration of race has led to an 11.1% decrease in the number of Asian-Americans admitted to Harvard.”
Leaders of numerous individual Catholic universities strongly criticized the decision, as did the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities (ACCU). The association, founded in 1899, has dozens of Catholic institutions as members and describes itself as the “voice of Catholic higher education.”
In a June 29 statement, the ACCU said the decision ignores “the more-than-apparent effects of continued racism in our society.” It objected that the decision undermines higher education’s voluntary efforts to solve the “social evil” of racism “in a society that provides too few solutions.”
The statement added that the ACCU would seek to act within the boundaries of the Supreme Court decision and continue to be guided by Catholic social teaching “to create paths by which those in society who do not have opportunity find it at our institutions.”
Georgetown University, a Jesuit school in the District of Columbia, led a coalition of Catholic universities and colleges that filed an amicus brief to the Supreme Court in support of affirmative action in the Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard case. The brief was joined by The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., and 55 other Catholic universities and colleges from across the country.
The brief argued for the “allowance of the use of race as one factor among others in college and university admissions policies.” It suggested affirmative action was part of religious freedom, saying “the free exercise of religion provides additional constitutional weight to the compelling interest in racial diversity in admissions for the Catholic institutions of higher learning.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor cited the brief in her dissenting opinion.
Georgetown University President John DeGioia issued a June 29 statement decrying the court’s decision. He vowed that the university would “remain committed” to “recruit, enroll, and support students from all backgrounds to ensure an enriching educational experience.”
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