The Order of Preachers, commonly known as the Dominican Order, is a Catholic mendicant order of pontifical right that was founded in France by a Castilian priest named Dominic de Guzmán. It was approved by Pope Honorius III via the papal bull Religiosam vitam on 22 December 1216. Members of the order, who are referred to as Dominicans, generally display the letters OP after their names, standing for Ordinis Praedicatorum, meaning 'of the Order of Preachers'. Membership in the order includes friars, nuns, active sisters, and lay or secular Dominicans. More recently, there have been a growing number of associates of the religious sisters who are unrelated to the tertiaries.
Raymond Leo Burke is an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He is a bishop and a cardinal, and was a patron of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta from 2014 to 2023. He led the Archdiocese of St. Louis from 2004 to 2008 and the Diocese of La Crosse from 1995 to 2004. From 2008 to 2014, he was the prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura.
Christoph Maria Michael Hugo Damian Peter Adalbert Schönborn, OP is a Bohemian-born Austrian Catholic prelate who has served as Archbishop of Vienna since 1995. He was previously chairman of the Austrian Bishops' Conference from 1998 to 2020 and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1998. He is a member of the Dominican Order.
Pope Francis is head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State. He is the first pope to be a member of the Society of Jesus, the first from the Americas and the Southern Hemisphere, and the first born or raised outside Europe since the 8th-century papacy of the Syrian pope Gregory III.
Timothy Michael Dolan is an American cardinal of the Catholic Church. He is the tenth and current archbishop of the Archdiocese of New York in the United States, having been appointed by Pope Benedict XVI in 2009.
James J. Martin is an American Jesuit priest, writer, editor-at-large of America magazine and the founder of Outreach.
Raniero Cantalamessa is an Italian Catholic cardinal and priest in the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin and a theologian. He served as the Preacher to the Papal Household from 1980 until 2024, under Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis.
Carlos Alfonso Azpiroz Costa, O.P. is an Argentinian Catholic friar of the Order of Preachers who has served as the Archbishop of Bahia Blanca since 2015. He was previously his religious order's superior general from 2001 to 2010.
The relationship between the Catholic Church and homosexuality is complex and often contentious, involving various conflicting views between the Catholic Church and some in the LGBTQ community. According to Catholic doctrine, solely having same-sex attractions itself is not considered inherently sinful; it is the act of engaging in sexual activity with someone of the same sex that is regarded as a grave sin against chastity. The Church also does not recognize nor perform any sacramental marriages between same-sex couples. However, the Catechism of the Catholic Church emphasizes that all same-sex individuals must "be accepted and treated with respect, compassion, and sensitivity," and that all forms of unjust discrimination should be discouraged and avoided at all cost.
Reinhard Marx is a German cardinal of the Catholic Church. He serves as the Archbishop of Munich and Freising. Pope Benedict XVI elevated Marx to the cardinalate in a consistory in 2010.
Gerhard Ludwig Müller is a German Catholic prelate who served as the Cardinal-Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from his appointment by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012 until 2017. Pope Francis elevated him to the rank of cardinal in 2014.
Robert Sarah is a Guinean prelate of the Catholic Church. A cardinal since 20 November 2010, he was prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments from 23 November 2014 to 20 February 2021, and is currently a Cardinal. Sarah previously served as secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples under Pope John Paul II and president of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum under Pope Benedict XVI.
Walter Brandmüller is a German prelate of the Catholic Church, a cardinal since 2010. He was president of the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences from 1998 to 2009.
Luis Antonio Chito Gokim Tagle is a Filipino prelate of the Catholic Church currently serving as the Pro-Prefect for the Section of Evangelization of Dicastery for Evangelization since June 5, 2022, and as the President of Interdicasterial Commission for Consecrated Religious since December 8, 2019. He was the 32nd Archbishop of Manila from 2011 to 2020. Tagle is the Cardinal-Bishop of San Felice da Cantalice a Centocelle and also serves as the President of the Catholic Biblical Federation, Grand Chancellor of the Pontifical Urbaniana University, and as a member of various departments and dicasteries in the Roman Curia.
Louis Raphaël I Sako is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.
Lorenzo Baldisseri is an Italian prelate of the Catholic Church who served as Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops from 21 September 2013 until 15 September 2020. He was made a cardinal in 2014. He previously served as Secretary of the Congregation for Bishops after more than twenty years in the diplomatic service of the Holy See that included stints as Apostolic Nuncio to Haiti, Paraguay, India, Nepal, and Brazil.
In the Catholic Church, the Synod of Bishops, considered as an advisory body for the pope, is one of the ways in which the bishops render cooperative assistance to him in exercising his office. It is described in the 1983 Code of Canon Law as "a group of bishops who have been chosen from different regions of the world and meet at fixed times to foster closer unity between the Roman Pontiff and bishops, to assist the Roman Pontiff with their counsel in the preservation and growth of faith and morals and in the observance and strengthening of ecclesiastical discipline, and to consider questions pertaining to the activity of the Church in the world."
Pope Francis has created cardinals at ten consistories held at roughly annual intervals beginning in 2014, most recently on 7 December 2024. The cardinals created by Francis include 163 cardinals from 76 countries, 25 of which had never been represented in the College of Cardinals. His appointments include the first Scandinavian since the Reformation, the first from Goa since an episcopal see was established there in 1533, the first from Latin America's indigenous peoples, the first from India's Dalit class, and the first active head of a religious congregation.
The 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, commonly referred to as the Synod on Synodality, was a Synod of Bishops of the Catholic Church which concluded 27 October 2024 and has as its theme "For a synodal Church: communion, participation and mission". It has been described as the culmination of Pope Francis's papacy and the most important event in the Church since the Second Vatican Council.
