Chicago’s cardinal Francis George announced this spring that the process to select his successor has begun. He submitted his resignation two years ago, when he turned 75, as required by canon law. As well, George announced in May that his cancer had returned and he is re-entering treatment.
The appointment of a new Archbishop of Chicago will likely be the most important appointment that Pope Francis makes in the American Church. George is the sixth archbishop of the Windy City to be made a cardinal, and his successor is likely to be the only cardinal in America’s Midwest region as St Louis and Detroit have declined in significance. This will also be the first major diocese filled since Pope Francis shuffled the membership of the Congregation for Bishops and stated, on several occasions and in different ways, that he wants shepherds who “have the smell of the sheep” upon them, men as interested in loving their flock as teaching it, let alone hectoring it.
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