Venezuelan Vatican diplomat Amaury Medina Blanco (48) is the successor to Kevin Randall, whom Pope Francis appointed archbishop and his new envoy to Bangladesh in August. This makes Medina the “second man” in the nunciature in the Austrian capital, after the Apostolic Nuncio Dom Pedro Lopez Quintana (70).
Social Minister Johannes Rauch visited a boiler room and a Caritas contact point for homeless women in Linz on Friday and emphasized the dignity of every human being…
At a reception on Friday evening at the Vienna Nunciature in honor of the outgoing and new Nutiatur Council, Randall highlighted the many positive impressions he has managed to leave during his service since the beginning of 2020 in Austria, “a country with a great cultural .” He has already expressed his thanks to the archbishop appointed the acting nunitus in Vienna, Archbishop López, for the intense time together due to Corona. He was able to learn a lot from the nuncio’s “wisdom, wealth of experience and diplomatic skills,” Randall said of the nuncio. In addition to Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, guests included the diocesan bishop of St. Pölten, Alois Schwarz, the military bishop Werner Freistetter and the Viennese auxiliary bishops Franz Scharl and Stephan Turnovszky.
Randall goes to Bangladesh
In Bangladesh it follows
Randall as Nuncio about Archbishop George Kocherry (78), whose age-related resignation the Pope accepted last year.
Before then, Randall will receive episcopal ordination, but the date has not yet been set.. Only then will he be able to start his service in Dhaka. Christians make up less than one percent of Bangladesh’s 165 million predominantly Muslim population. According to estimates, around 270,000 Catholics live in the two archdioceses of Dhaka and Chittagong, as well as in the other six dioceses. Pope Francis visited the South Asian country in 2017.
The new nunciature council
Amaury Medina Blanco comes from Machiquez, in the Venezuelan Archdiocese of Barquisimeto, for which he was ordained a priest in 1999. He studied philosophy, theology and canon law in Barquisimeto and Rome. In 2003, Medina joined the Holy See’s diplomatic service. Since then, he has worked in Vatican missions in Indonesia, Congo, Paraguay and the World Trade Organization in Geneva, as well as in Ireland, Brazil and Portugal. Before moving to Vienna, Medina most recently served as a nunciature counselor at the Apostolic Nunciature of Sarajevo, responsible for Bosnia-Herzegovina and Montenegro, since 2020.
(cap – sst)