֎Luis Antonio Gokim TAGLE (elevated 2012)

The Popeular History Podcast

IMAGE CREDIT AND DESCRIPTION:
Perrant, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, Archbishop of Manila, during the display of St. Caesarius's relics at Manila Cathedral. Image digitally brightened (and cropped, but all the images I use are cropped, so take that for granted).
LINKS

Vatican bio of Cardinal Tagle:

https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/documentation/cardinali_biografie/cardinali_bio_tagle_la.html

Luis Antionio Gokim Tagle on FIU's Cardinals Database (by Salvadore Miranda):

https://cardinals.fiu.edu/bios2012-ii.htm#Tagle

Cardinal Tagle on Gcatholic.org:

http://www.gcatholic.org/p/3166

Cardinal Tagle on Catholic-Hierarchy.org:

https://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/bishop/btaglelag.html

Archdiocese of Manila on Gcatholic.org:

http://www.gcatholic.org/dioceses/diocese/mani0.htm?tab=info

Archdiocese of Manila on Catholic-Hierarchy.org:

https://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/diocese/dmanp.html
Pope_Predictor on X:

https://x.com/pope_predictor?lang=en

500 YOC (Years of Christianity) video with Cardinal Tagle (English):

https://youtu.be/Qre_7cf05VQ?si=_oCde2TKTAQuBJXY

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TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to Popeular History, a library of Catholic knowledge and insights.

Check out the show notes for sources, further reading, and a transcript.

Today we're discussing another current Cardinal of the Catholic Church, one of the 120 or so people who will choose the next Pope when the time comes.

Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle was born on June 21, 1957 in Manila, the capital and second largest city of the Philippines, located on Luzon, the large island that makes up most of the north of the country.

When you're born in a city comparable to New York, there's no need to go far to get your education. Of course, some do, but Luis kept things local through ordination, while still maintaining the norm of getting your philosophy and theology pieces of seminary training at separate institutions.

By 25, Father Tagle was a priest for the Archdiocese of Manila, serving as a pastor in a parish south of Manila proper and as a spiritual director at a nearby seminary. By the venerable age of 26, he was serving as rector of the seminary- the San Carlos Diocesan Seminary of Imus.

Father Tagle, who prefers to go by his nickname Chito, did go further afield in 1985, studying in Rome and the Catholic University of America, where he got a doctorate in theology in 1991. Having a doctorate didn't make him too big for his britches, he resumed pastoral work, carrying on into the new millennium doing that and various special roles within the Diocese–and some work on the global scale as well, serving on the International Theological Commission from 1997 to 2002.

In 2002, he was elected Bishop of Imus, that “south of Manila proper” area where his first pastoral assignment had taken place. His principal consecrator was Cardinal Sin, who, thankfully, spoke English and knew darn well he had a funny name for a Cardinal, taking to calling his lodgings “the house of Sin”. But enough about that, I need to stay focused on Tagle's rising star, because obviously, he's not done yet.

In 2011, Chito was made Archbishop of Manila. It's hard to think of a posting more likely to get you a red hat in the globalized Church than Manila. And it may be kind of weird to hear me talk about the globalized church given catholic has always meant universal and the Catholic Church has always been a big broad thing, but the reality is that for a good long while thanks to colonialism and other factors the college of Cardinals was primarily a European affair, with conclaves as recently as the 1922 election of Pius XI having only European participants. But the focus of the Church has shifted, the lens has widened, and it's hard to ignore the fact that over 92 million Catholics live in the Philippines. Actually, I suppose it's not *that* hard to ignore that fact, since it used to be something pretty well ignored, but since 1960 Manila has always had a Cardinal, or at least if the Cardinal of Manila had just died, their successor would get a red hat in the next consistory. So naturally, as Archbishop of Manila, Chito was made a Cardinal when Pope Benedict created new Cardinals in February 2012, right?

Well, yes, but actually no, because his predecessor–not the wonderfully named Cardinal Sin but the guy between them, Cardinal Rosales--was still a Cardinal under the age of 80 and therefore even though he had retired from active service as the bishop he was still eligible to participate in any future conclaves, and it wouldn't do to have two Cardinals representing Manila in one conclave. Of course that's all conjecture but I'm far from the first to propose that logic and the pattern of being reluctant to make someone a Cardinal as long as their predecessor is still around as a voting Cardinal does seem to check out when you look at the data.

In any event, Cardinal Rosales turned 80 later in 2012 and Archbishop Tagle was on Pope Benedict's surprise supplemental November consistory towards the end of that year. I won't go too far down the rabbit hole of interpreting that supplemental consistory as an early warning sign of Pope Benedicts’ shocking [retirement] announcement a few months later, but, well, that *is* a thing that happened, and so, like Baselios Cardinal Cleemis we talked about right before I went on hiatus, Chito found himself participating in the 2013 conclave that elected Pope Francis.

Now, I know we're going to have lots more opportunities to talk about papal conclaves as we go. So ideally I'd ease you into this conversation. But the reality is Cardinal Tagle is currently the odds-on favorite to become Pope after the next conclave, and while that's far from a guarantee–conclaves are famously unpredictable--its not something I'd feel right, you know, not mentioning. So with that out of the way, keep that in mind as we go. By the way, feel free to follow @pope_predictor on the platform formerly known as Twitter, or wherever else you and/or they might be using by the time you listen to this. Their papability index isn't the only thing out there projecting Tagle as the favorite, but they're one of the more engaging and they said I could call them a friend of the show so there you have it.

Anyways, Cardinal Tagle is fluent in speaking his native Tagalog language, as well as English and Italian. He can also read Spanish, French, Korean and Latin.

Staying in 2013, he was made a member of the Pontifical Council for the Family and of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerants, as well as the Congregation for Education. But why stop there? In 2014, he was named member of the Pontifical Council for the Laity and also the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.

In 2015, the good folks at Caritas must have seen him looking bored, because they went and made him their president, and he was also added to the Pontifical Council Cor Unum. I'm not going to spell out every post he's held but I did want to give you an idea. By 2020 his curial responsibilities had reached the point where he resigned the Archbishopric of Manila and became a full time curial Cardinal. The pivotal appointment there was his appointment as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples. 2020 was also the year where he reached a height not yet obtained by any other cardinal we've discussed so far: he was elevated to the status of Cardinal-Bishop, which yes, historically had something to do with one being both a Cardinal and a Bishop, but nowadays Cardinal Priests and even Cardinal Deacons are typically bishops too so the distinction is a bit more nuanced. In the end, it's the highest tier within the college of Cardinals. There are currently a dozen Cardinal Bishops, which, it should be noted, is more than there used to be.

I'm well past word count at this point. I'll simply note that in terms of his current titles, Chito is a member of seven Dicasteries–nearly half of them, there are sixteen by my count—and two of the Vatican's financial oversight groups with unwieldy names. And, of course, more besides.

Luis Antonio Gokim Cardinal Tagle is eligible to participate in future conclaves until he turns 80 in 2037.

Today's episode is part of Cardinal Numbers, and there will be more Cardinal Numbers next week. Thank you for listening; God bless you all! Thanks, Joe!