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Rome (CNA/r) – On 1 September Pope Francis announced the appointment of 13 new Cardinals - three of whom are Jesuits: the Archbishop of Luxembourg and President of the Commission of European Bishops' Conferences (COMECE) Jean-Claude Hollerich SJ and the Canadian Jesuit Michael Czerny SJ, Head of the Refugee and Migration Section of the Vatican Development Agency. Furthermore, the Pope wants to elevate the Archbishop Emeritus of Kaunas in Lithuania, Sigitas Tamkevičius SJ, to the position of Cardinal for his services to the Church, but due to his age he can no longer participate in a possible election of the Pope.

Jean-Claude Hollerich SJ (61) was born on 9 August 1958 in Differdange, Luxembourg. Since 2011, he has been Archbishop of Luxembourg, a traditional Catholic country. Shortly after taking office, the Jesuit appeared as a crisis manager when the government elected in 2013 around the liberal Prime Minister Xavier Bettel aimed at a stronger separation of the state-church relationship. In 2018, Hollerich assumed the post of Chairman of the EU Bishops' Commission COMECE. In this function he acts as a mediator between different points of view for a European solution of the refugee question.

Michael Czerny SJ (73), born 1946 in what was then Czechoslovakia, is a Jesuit from Canada and since 2017 Undersecretary of the "Dicastery for the integral Development of Man". He achieved fame as a migration expert of the Vatican. He repeatedly called for a more open EU migration policy and more action against human trafficking and exploitation worldwide. In May, the Pope appointed him one of the Special Secretaries of the Amazon Synod, which takes place in October in the Vatican.

Sigitas Tamkevičius SJ (80) is regarded as a symbolic figure for the Lithuanian church and the Lithuanian resistance in the Soviet regime. As a Jesuit he was persecuted by the regime, Tamkevicius spent several years in Gulags "because of anti-Soviet agitation and deeds". He was the founder and editor-in-chief of the "Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania", a magazine documenting the persecution of the Church by Soviet power between 1972 and 1989. In 1996 he took over the leadership of the archdiocese of Kaunas. He chaired the Lithuanian Bishops' Conference for two terms. When he retired in 2015, the General Secretary of the Bishops' Conference praised Tamkevicius as a "legend of church resistance". As such he once again played a role in the Pope's visit in 2018: Francis was accompanied by Tamkevicius during his visit to the former KGB torture prison.

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