OTHER PONTIFICAL ACTS

VATICAN CITY, MAR 20, 2001 (VIS) - The Holy Father appointed:

- Bishop Jose Sotero Valero Ruiz, auxiliary of Valencia, Venezuela, as bishop of Guanare (area 15,200, population 760,000, Catholics 700,000, priests 33, religious 65), Venezuela.

- Fr. Joseph Lai Hung Seng, pastor of the cathedral of Macao, as coadjutor of the bishop of Macao (area, 19, population 430,500, Catholics 28,015, priests 83, religious 228), China. The bishop-elect was born in 1946 in Macao and was ordained a priest in 1972.

- Bishop Filiberto Jimenez Narvaez, emeritus of Riohacha, Colombia, as auxiliary of the archbishop of Medellin (area 708, population 2,952,956, Catholics 2,512,065, priests 896, religious 3,560), Colombia.

- Msgr. Joaquin Maria Lopez de Andujar, vicar general since 1991 of the diocese of Getafe, as auxiliary of the bishop of Getafe (area 2,295, population 1,122,601, Catholics 639,500, priests 243, religious 816), Spain. The bishop-elect was born in 1842 in Madrid, Spain and was ordained a priest in 1968.

On Saturday, March 17, it was made public that he appointed the following as members of the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue: Archbishop Buti Joseph Tlhagale of Bloemfontein, South Africa; Bishops Jean Khamse Vithavong, apostolic vicar of Vientiane, Laos; Gabriel Piroird of Constantine, Algeria; Albert Ayinde Fasina of Ijebu-Ode, Nigeria; Tod David Brown of Orange in California, U.S.A., Charles Maung Bo of Pathein, Myanmar; Vincent Coulibaly of Kankan, Guinea-Conakry; Paul Yoshinao Otsuka of Kyoto, Japan; Andrew Francis of Multan, Pakistan; Patrick O'Donoghue, auxiliary of Westminster, Great Britain, and Everard Johannes de Jong, auxiliary of Roermund, Netherlands.

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