Şule Rogenbuke

Message of Fr. Petru Vârgâ, Chancellor of the Apostolic Vicariate of Istanbul, on the occasion of the death of Monsignor Louis Pelâtre:

H.E. Mgr Louis-Armel Pelâtre, A.A. (1940–2026)

Mgr Louis-Armel Pelâtre was born on 12 May 1940 in Pancé, in the French department of Ille-et-Vilaine. He made his religious profession in the Congregation of the Augustinians of the Assumption on 15 September 1962 and was ordained a priest in La Rochelle on 24 May 1969.

He arrived in Türkiye on 4 October 1970. After a brief stay in Ankara, he began his ministry among the Catholic community of Moda-Kadıköy in Istanbul. From 1980 to 1989, he served as Superior of the Assumptionists in Türkiye, before being appointed Vicar General of the Apostolic Vicariate of Istanbul in 1990.

On 9 July 1992, Saint John Paul II appointed him titular bishop of Sasima and Apostolic Vicar of Istanbul. He received episcopal ordination on 13 September 1992 at the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit. He served as President of Caritas Türkiye and was first a consultor and subsequently a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. From 1995 to 2001, he served as President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Turkey.

On 16 April 2016, Pope Francis accepted his resignation from the pastoral governance of the Vicariate, submitted in accordance with the age limit. During more than fifty-five years spent in Türkiye, he devoted his ministry to the pastoral care of the Catholic community, the unity of Christians, and interreligious dialogue.

After a long period of suffering, borne with great faith, Mgr Louis Pelâtre returned to the Father’s House on 20 August 2026, at the age of 86.

His funeral will be celebrated on Monday, 24 August 2026, at 6:00 p.m., at the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit in Istanbul.

Solidarity call of Monsignor Martin, Metropolitan Archbishop of İzmir and President of CET, for Venezuela after the earhquake:

With great joy and deep gratitude, we announce:

By the decision of the Synod gathered under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, His Beatitude and Eminence Pavlos III (Emil Shimoun Nona) has been elected as the new Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church.

At this blessed and historic moment, we give thanks to our Lord and pray that our new Patriarch may lead our Church with faith, wisdom, and love. We wish that he may be a unifying father and a faithful shepherd to all the faithful.

As the Chaldean Catholic Church, we express our loyalty and affirm that we stand by him with our prayers.

May the Lord protect him and bless his ministry.

Robert Francis Prevost is elected the 267th Pope of the Catholic Church on May 8, 2025. He chose the name Leon XIV.

He was born on September 14, 1955, in Chicago. He spent his childhood and adolescence in the United States, studying first in the minor seminary of the Augustinian Fathers and then, at Villanova University, Pennsylvania, where, in 1977, he received a degree in Mathematics and studied Philosophy. On Sept. 1 of that year in St. Louis he entered the novitiate of the Order of St. Augustine (Osa), in the province of Our Lady of Good Counsel in Chicago, and made his first profession on Sept. 2, 1978. On August 29, 1981, he made his solemn vows.

He received his education at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, graduating with a degree in Theology. And at the age of 27, he was sent by his superiors to Rome to study Canon Law at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum). In Urbe he was ordained a priest on June 19, 1982.

He received his license in 1984 and the following year was sent to the Augustinian mission in Chulucanas, Piura, Peru (1985-1986).

In 1988 he reached the mission in Trujillo, also in Peru, as director of the common formation project for Augustinian aspirants from the vicariates of Chulucanas, Iquitos and Apurímac. In the span of eleven years he held the positions of community prior (1988-1992), director of formation (1988-1998) and teacher of the professed (1992-1998) and in the Archdiocese of Trujillo of judicial vicar (1989-1998) and professor of Canon Law, Patristics and Morals in the Major Seminary “San Carlos and San Marcelo.” At the same time he was also entrusted with the pastoral care of Our Lady Mother of the Church, later erected parish under the title of St. Rita (1988-1999), in the poor outskirts of the city, and was parochial administrator of Our Lady of Monserrat from 1992-1999.

In 1999 he was elected prior provincial of the Augustinian Province “Mother of Good Counsel” in Chicago, and two and a half years later, at the Ordinary General Chapter of the Order of St. Augustine, his brethren chose him as prior general, confirming him in 2007 for a second term.

In October 2013 he returned to his Augustinian Province, in Chicago, and was director of Formation at St. Augustine’s Friary, first counselor and vicar provincial; positions he held until Pope Francis appointed him, on Nov. 3, 2014, apostolic administrator of the Peruvian Diocese of Chiclayo and at the same time titular bishop of Sufar. On Sept. 26, 2015, he was appointed bishop of Chiclayo by the Argentine pontiff.

On Jan. 30, 2023, the Pope called him to Rome as prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, promoting him to archbishop. And in the Consistory of Sept. 30 of the same year he creates and publishes him cardinal, assigning him the diaconate of Santa Monica.