Three Filipino church leaders are among the newly appointed members of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication, with Pope Leo XIV formalizing the appointments on Thursday.
San Pablo Bishop Marcelino Antonio Maralit and Agaña Archbishop Ryan Jimenez join Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle on the expanded body, which manages the Vatican’s entire communications infrastructure and shapes the theological and pastoral dimensions of the Church’s outreach — particularly across digital platforms.
Maralit brings direct regional communications experience to the role. He chairs the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines Episcopal Commission on Social Communications, a position he has held since 2019, and leads the Office of Social Communications of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences — the body that oversees Radio Veritas Asia, the Quezon City-based broadcaster that operates in coordination with the Vatican’s communications arm. He was installed as the fifth bishop of San Pablo in Laguna in 2024.
Jimenez, who heads the Episcopal Conference of the Pacific (CEPAC), was ordained a priest in 2003 in Dumaguete City. He was designated Apostolic Administrator of Chalan Kanoa in 2010 before being named that diocese’s second bishop in 2016.
Tagle’s appointment to the dicastery follows a notable stretch of Vatican assignments. In October 2025, he was given the Suburbicarian Diocese of Albano — one of seven historic sees surrounding Rome — a title that had briefly been assigned to Cardinal Robert Prevost before the latter was elected Pope Leo XIV on May 8, two days before he was to formally take possession of the see. Tagle previously served as Archbishop of Manila from 2011 to 2020 and currently holds the role of pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization.
Other clergymen appointed to the Dicastery for Communication include Cardinals Fridolin Ambongo Besungu of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Cristóbal López Romero of Rabat, Filipe Neri Ferrão of India, and José Tolentino de Mendonça of Portugal; Archbishop Salvatore Fisichella of Italy; Bishop Bernardin Francis Mfumbasa of Kondoa in Tanzania; Bishop Lizardo Estrada Herrera of Cuzco in Peru; and Father Roberto Pasolini of Italy.
