by Anura Guruge
on November 1, 2022
From 768 (when Cardinal Bishops came to be) till 2018 when Pope Francis created what I call the Irregular Cardinal Bishops, i.e., for a period 1,250 years, you could ONLY be a Cardinal Bishop if you were heading up one of the Suburbicarian Sees, i.e., major dioceses around Rome (but not within Rome per se). So, prior to 2018 the number of Cardinal Bishops you could have were tied to the number of Suburbicarian Sees. Over the centuries the number has changed has dioceses were merged & sometimes even split.
For the last few centuries, however, the number has been SEVEN (7) as shown above.
It has also been the case, that as of 1150, the See of ‘Ostia’ is ALWAYS assigned to the Dean of the College of Cardinals.
As of 2018, you don’t need a Suburbicarian See in order to be a Cardinal Bishop. We now have 5 Cardinal Bishops, as shown in the TOP image, who don’t have a Suburbicarian See but are Cardinal Bishops — but Irregular Cardinal Bishops because of that.
A Suburbicarian See still has cachet & is coveted.
So, it is a bit strange to see one sitting vacant.
The pope can assign it OUTSIDE of a consistory.
Yes, it has only been 5 months. This could just be a sign of respect. Not rushing to give the see away as soon as the prior Cardinal Bishop, in this instance, Sodano, died. I hope that is the case.
There is another possibility. That of RADICAL Pope Francis setting out to downplay the importance of Suburbicarian Sees, i.e., trying to stress that their importance was in the past. Going forward you are going to have Cardinal Bishops independent of Suburbicarian Sees. My goal here was just to point out that Albano has been now vacant for 5 months.
It sure will make a nice Christmas present.
