Two officials at the Vatican's doctrinal office will be ordained bishops

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Two top officials within the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith will be ordained bishops.

The Vatican announced July 29 that Pope Francis has decided Msgr. John Kennedy, 56, the secretary of the dicastery's disciplinary section, will be an archbishop and have the "titular see" of Ossero, an ancient diocese in Croatia that ceased functioning in the 19th century.

Msgr. Philippe Curbelié, undersecretary of the dicastery, will be a bishop and have the "titular see" of Utica. The Vatican did not provide a date for their episcopal ordinations.

Archbishop-elect Kennedy was ordained a priest in the Archdiocese of Dublin, Ireland, in 1993. He started working as an official at the then-Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2003. In 2022 Pope Francis named him secretary of the dicastery and head of the disciplinary section, which handles abuse cases.

Bishop-elect Curbelié was born in 1968 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, and ordained a priest of the Diocese of Toulouse in 1995. He was dean of the faculty of theology at the Institut Catholique de Toulouse and professor of dogmatic theology before he started working at the then-Congregation for Catholic Education in 2012.

Pope Francis appointed him undersecretary of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2022.