TIRANA, Oct. 9 – Pope Francis named Ernest Troshani Simoni as one of the 17 new cardinals to the to the College of Cardinals of the Catholic Church in a clear signal of his “honor and gratitude” for Albania’s suffering clergy during Communism. The announcement was made on Sunday in the Vatican.
The 88-year-old cardinal brought Pope Francis to tears during his 2014 one-day visit to Albania, a country that takes pride in its interfaith harmony. At the time Pope Francis met with priests and seminarians at the Tirana cathedral, while Father Simoni told the Pope about his ordeal during Albania’s brutal communist rule.
He spent two decades imprisoned, tortured and sentenced to 28 years of forced labor for refusing to speak out against the Catholic Church.
During his incarceration, Simoni became the spiritual guide to many other prisoners. He was freed in 1981 but continued preaching Christianity in secret until the communist regime fell in 1990.
While reading the Italian translation of Simoni’s revelations, Pope Francis became visibly upset and got tears in his eyes. Father Simoni knelt before the Pope and the two embraced for nearly a minute as priests and nuns applauded in the audience.
Simoni will be formally elevated at a Vatican ceremony on Nov. 19, two weeks after the beatification of 38 of his fellow believers who were persecuted or executed under Hoxha’s regime. The ceremony will be held in Shkoder in northwestern Albania, where the first public Mass was held after the fall of communism.
A spokesperson from Albania’s Catholic Church said that although Simoni can’t vote in a conclave to elect a new pope, his nomination is “homage to a cleric symbolizing all Albania’s suffering clergy.”
Ernest Troshani Simoni is the second Albanian cardinal to be honored after Mikel Koliqi who was elevated by Pope John Paul II to the College of Cardinals in November 1994.
