Six new cardinals joined on Saturday the elite club of red-robed churchmen who will elect the next pope, bringing a more geographically diverse mix into the European-dominated College of Cardinals.
Pope Benedict XVI presided over the ceremony in St. Peter's Basilica to formally elevate the six men, who hail from Colombia, India, Lebanon, Nigeria, the Philippines and the United States. As Benedict read each name aloud in Latin, cheers and applause erupted from their friends and family members in the pews.
The new cardinals are: Archbishop James Harvey, the American prefect of the papal household; Abuja, Nigeria Archbishop John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan; Bogota, Colombia Archbishop Ruben Salazar Gomez; Manila, Philippines Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle; Patriarch of Antioch of the Maronites in Lebanon, His Beatitude Bechara Boutros Rai; and the major Archbishop of the Trivandrum of the Siro-Malankaresi in India, His Beatitude Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal.
Pope Benedict said Saturday that the new cardinals represent the "unique, universal and all-inclusive identity" of the Catholic Church.
"In this consistory, I want to highlight in particular the fact that the church is the church of all peoples, and so she speaks in the various cultures of the different continents," he told the crowd.
While Benedict didn't mention the cardinals' primary task in his remarks, he did remind them that the scarlet of their cassock and hat that they wear symbolizes the blood that cardinals must be willing to shed to remain faithful to the church.
"From now on you will be even more closely and intimately linked to the See of Peter," he said.