Age, Biography, and Wiki
Luis Antonio Tagle was born on June 21, 1957, in Manila, Philippines. He is a notable figure in the Catholic Church, serving as the Pro-Prefect for the Section for First Evangelization and New Particular Churches within the Dicastery for Evangelization. Tagle is currently 67 years old and resides in Vatican City, following his appointment as Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples in 2019.
| Occupation | Theologians |
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| Date of Birth | 21 June 1957 |
| Age | 68 Years |
| Birth Place | Manila, Philippines |
| Horoscope | Gemini |
| Country | Philippines |
Height, Weight & Measurements
There is limited information available regarding Luis Antonio Tagle's physical measurements such as height and weight.
Since after becoming Bishop of Imus, later as Archbishop of Manila, and further as a Vatican pro-prefect, Tagle continues to host The Word Exposed and The Faith Exposed, both Catholic television programs produced by the Jesuit Communications Foundation, which also maintains official social media accounts for him. He is also the Tuesday presenter of Kape't Pandasal ("Coffee and Prayer", a pun on the Filipino term kape't pandesal or "coffee and salted bread"), an early morning religious inspirational program partly produced by the same media arm, broadcast on TV Maria, DepEd ALS, and previously on ABS-CBN, and now streaming in YouTube.
Cardinal Tagle's episcopal motto remains Dominus Est ("It is the Lord!"), drawn from the Gospel of John 21:7. The updated coat of arms of Tagle retains all the principal elements previously found on the sinister side of his arms during his tenure as Archbishop of Manila. Following his transition to new ecclesiastical responsibilities, the arms of the Archdiocese are no longer depicted. The new version of the coat of arms adopts a different marshalling (division) to ensure to a heraldically correct arrangement of elements. The coat of arms is parted tierced (in three parts) per pall reversed. In the dexter (heraldic right) field, which is rendered in gold (Or), there is an open Bible bearing the Greek letters Alpha (Α) and Omega (Ω) in black (Sable). Beside the Bible is the image of the Good Shepherd, shown in natural colors (Proper), carrying a sheep upon his shoulders and holding a wooden staff in his right hand. A fishing net is suspended from the shepherd's right arm, extending downward, with five fish entangled within it.
The coat of arms is blasoned as follows: Tierced per pall reversed Or, Azure and Vert. In dexter side, arranged in fess, an open Bible inscribed with the Greek letters Α and Ω Sable, and an image of the Good Shepherd Proper carrying a sheep upon his shoulders and holding a wooden staff Proper in his dexter hand, a net Sable, sinister chief point suspended from the dexter arm of the Good Shepherd and the dexter fesse point to the base, five fishes Sable entangled in the net. Issuing out of the base of sinister side, a Corinthian Pillar Or surmounted by the monogram of the Blessed Virgin Mary Argent, crowned and encircled by twelve stars, all of the first. In base, a Carpenter's square Or superimposed on two lilies stalked and leaved, all of the fifth. Behind the shield is an archepiscopal cross. Both are surmounted by a galero with fifteen tassels pendant from both sides in 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5, all Gules.
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Dating & Relationship Status
As a Catholic cardinal, Luis Antonio Tagle has taken a vow of celibacy, which means he is not married and does not engage in romantic relationships.
In February 2012, Tagle attended the Symposium for Healing and Renewal at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. Tagle discussed the way the sex-abuse crisis manifests itself in Asia, where it is more common for priests to violate their vows of celibacy by taking mistresses than to engage in the sexual abuse of minors. Tagle maintained that the deference to authority typical of Asian culture combined with the dominance of the Catholic Church in a country like the Philippines produced a "culture of shame" that continued to inhibit the reporting of instances of abuse. He said that culture needed to change though he anticipated great difficulties: "The relative silence with which the victims and Asian Catholics face the scandal is partly due to the culture of 'shame' that holds dearly one's humanity, honor, and dignity. For Asian cultures, a person's shame tarnishes one's family, clan, and community. Silence could be a way of preserving what is left of one's honor." Tagle said the fact his country had a "touching culture" that created problems of interpretation and mandatory reporting laws would face cultural hurdles as well. On June 12, 2012, Tagle was appointed a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education for a five-year renewable term. That same day, Tagle spoke at the 50th International Eucharistic Congress in Dublin, Ireland. He discussed how the sexual abuse crisis requires the Catholic Church to reevaluate its relationship with the media. He said: "As we challenge them to be fair and truthful in whatever they are reporting, the Church should also be prepared to be scrutinised by media, provided the norms of fairness and truthfulness are applied to all, especially the victims." He decried the tendency of church officials to resent negative media coverage even when accurate, while noting he had witnessed some media coverage in Asia that is tainted by "an anti-Christian sentiment." He also mentioned the various issues which distinguish the experience of the Church in Ireland and similar cases in Asia.
"Migration is about human persons. I have observed that some people who are afraid of migrants or refugees have had very little personal encounter with them. They do not even know the people they fear. By meeting them, touching their wounds, listening to their stories and dreams, we might see ourselves in them. They are not strangers. They could be me, my parents, my brothers and sisters, my friend."
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Net Worth and Salary
Luis Antonio Tagle's net worth is estimated to be between $1 million and $5 million, according to various sources. His financial status is influenced by his roles within the Catholic Church, including his position as Archbishop of Manila, which is valued at approximately 100 million pesos. However, as a member of the clergy, his personal financial wealth is not as significant as his influence and leadership within the Church.
Career, Business, and Investments
Tagle's career is marked by his dedication to the Catholic Church. He rose from being a humble priest to becoming a prominent figure in the global Catholic community. His appointment to the Vatican in 2019 further solidified his status as a leading religious leader. As Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, Tagle plays a crucial role in overseeing the Church's missionary efforts worldwide. He was also a key figure in the 2025 papal conclave, where he was considered a potential successor to Pope Francis due to his progressive stance.
On August 4, 2012, Tagle delivered a speech at a prayer rally against the Reproductive Health Bill, which included provisions for the funding and distribution of birth control information and devices; contraception is customarily considered abortion in the Philippines. He advocated for the recognition of women's rights by recognizing their valued role as mothers and wives, deserving of genuine love and respect as reflections of God and a gift to mankind. Tagle also denounced sexual prostitution as an affront to women's femininity. He took a more moderate stance on the legislation than other Philippine bishops, refusing to threaten politicians who supported the legislation with excommunication or to have posters criticizing its supporters as "Team Death" distributed in Manila's parishes.
Tagle served as archbishop of Manila until he assumed the position as Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples on February 9, 2020. While awaiting for the date of assuming his new position, he served as the apostolic administrator of the metropolitan see on his last two months as Archbishop of Manila from December 8, 2019, to February 9, 2020. Auxiliary Bishop Broderick Pabillo temporarily headed the Archdiocese as apostolic administrator from February 9, 2020. On March 25, 2021, Pope Francis named Capiz Archbishop Cardinal Jose Advincula to succeed Tagle as Archbishop of Manila. Advincula was then installed as Tagle's successor on June 24, 2021.
Social Network
Luis Antonio Tagle is not known for having a significant presence on social media platforms, as his focus is on religious leadership rather than personal online engagement.
Benedict XVI named Tagle as one of the Synod Fathers for the Synod of Bishops on the New Evangelisation on September 18, 2012. In his intervention at that synod, he outlined how he believed the church should approach the process of evangelization. He said: "The Church must discover the power of silence. Confronted with the sorrows, doubts, and uncertainties of people she cannot pretend to give easy solutions... The Church's humility, respectfulness, and silence might reveal more clearly the face of God in Jesus. The world takes delight in a simple witness to Jesus-meek and humble of heart." In an interview with Vatican Radio, he explained how his view reflected the experience of Asian and Philippine culture: "The Church of Asia is often a minority Church, like John the Baptist crying in the wilderness ... even in the Philippines, though the Church is a majority. I realise that the sufferings of people and the difficult questions they ask are an invitation to be first in solidarity with them, not to pretend we have all the solutions. ... I believe the Church should contribute in the public square but we in Asia are very particular about the mode ... so you may be saying the right things but people will not listen if the manner by which you communicate reminds them of a triumphalist, know-it-all institution. ... I know that in some parts of Asia the relative silence, calmness of the Church is interpreted as timidity, but I say no – it makes the Church more credible."
On November 30, 2013, Tagle was named member of the Congregation for Catholic Education. He was then named member of the Congregation for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and the Societies of Apostolic Life on March 29, 2014. Pope Francis named Tagle Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples on December 8, 2019. Tagle is the second Asian to head that Congregation, following Cardinal Ivan Dias, who was prefect from 2006 to 2011. He is the second Filipino cardinal to lead a congregation of the Roman Curia after Jose Tomas Sanchez, who headed the Congregation for the Clergy from 1991 to 1996. In March 2020, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said the Pope had removed Tagle from his post in Manila for channeling church funds to the President's political opponents. The Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) and many individual Philippine prelates denounced Duterte's charge.
Pope Francis promoted him to highest rank of cardinal, Cardinal-Bishop, on May 1, 2020; he is the first Filipino to be included in that rank of the College of Cardinals, and he was promoted Cardinal-Bishop but was not appointed to a suburbicarian see just like Cardinals Parolin, Sandri, Ouelet and Filoni, a break with tradition and Canon Law Section 350. On June 19, 2020, the Pope named him member of the Pontifical Council for the Legislative Texts. On July 8, 2020, the Pope named him member of the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue. On September 10, 2020, Tagle tested positive for COVID-19 upon his arrival in Manila. He was the first head of a Vatican dicastery, as well as the fifth Filipino bishop, to test positive for COVID-19. He had tested negative for the virus in Rome on September 7. He was asymptomatic and was in isolation. Tagle remained asymptomatic and ended his quarantine on September 23. On September 21, 2020, he was named member of the Cardinalial Commission of the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR).
In the same interview, Tagle said that "Every situation for those who are divorced and remarried is quite unique. To have a general rule might be counterproductive in the end.... We cannot give one formula for all." In 2017, Tagle led the Lazarus Project, a social media campaign for Easter which called for greater acceptance of people traditionally judged such as sex workers, the homeless, and LGBTQ people in Catholic churches using the hashtag #ResurrectLove.
Education
Tagle holds a Doctor of Sacred Theology degree from the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium. His educational background has been instrumental in shaping his theological and leadership skills within the Church.
Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle (, ; born June 21, 1957) is a Filipino prelate of the Catholic Church, and the Pro-Prefect for the Section for First Evangelization and New Particular Churches of the Dicastery for Evangelization (formerly Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples) since December 8, 2019. He previously served as the 32nd Archbishop of Manila from 2011 to 2020. Tagle is the current Cardinal-Bishop of Albano and also serves as the President of the Catholic Biblical Federation, Grand Chancellor of the Pontifical Urbaniana University, President of Interdicasterial Commission for Consecrated Religious, and as a member of various departments and dicasteries in the Roman Curia. He is often referred to by his nickname, Chito.
After completing elementary and high school at Saint Andrew's School in Parañaque, Rizal in 1973, Tagle was influenced by priest friends to enter the Jesuit San José Seminary, which sent him to the Jesuit Ateneo de Manila University, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in pre-divinity from the Ateneo in 1977 and then a Master of Arts in theology at the same university's Loyola School of Theology. Tagle earned his Doctorate in Sacred Theology at the Catholic University of America from 1987 to 1991. He wrote his dissertation under the direction of Joseph A. Komonchak on "Episcopal Collegiality in the Teaching and Practice of Paul VI". Tagle also attended doctrinal courses at the Institute of Pope Paul VI University. In Komonchak's estimation, Tagle was "one of the best students I had in over 40 years of teaching" and "could have become the best theologian in the Philippines, or even in all of Asia" had he not been appointed bishop. Tagle has received honorary degrees from Catholic Theological Union and La Salle University. Tagle is a native Tagalog speaker and is fluent in English and Italian. He is also proficient in reading Spanish, French, Korean, Chinese, and Latin.
Pope Benedict XVI announced he was elevating Archbishop Tagle to the College of Cardinals on October 24, 2012. Tagle himself had been notified the night before. At that consistory, he was assigned the titular church of San Felice da Cantalice a Centocelle. Tagle was the seventh Filipino to be made a cardinal of the Catholic Church. When he became a cardinal he was the second youngest one. On December 1, 2012, upon his return to the Philippines, he presided at a thanksgiving Mass at the San Fernando de Dilao Church in Paco, Manila, which President Benigno Aquino III, Vice-president Jejomar Binay, and Mayor Alfredo Lim of Manila attended.
"I speak for my Philippines. In the preparation phase, I spoke quite a bit about poverty and the emigration phenomenon: two issues which are not exclusive to the family context affected the very core of family life. In our country there is no law on divorce. But people do divorce out of love. Fathers and mothers separate out of love for their children and one of them goes to the other side of the world to work. These separations are triggered by love. In the Philippines and countries affected by migration, we must, as a Church, accompany these people, help them to be faithful to their wives and husbands." Tagle is a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education, Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, Pontifical Council for the Family, Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, Pontifical Council for the Laity, and XIII Ordinary Council of the Secretariat General of the Synod of Bishops. On July 11, 2015, he was made a member of the Pontifical Council 'Cor Unum'. He was also confirmed by Pope Francis as President of the Catholic Biblical Federation on March 5, 2015. On May 14, 2015, he was elected President of Caritas International replacing Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga.
In November 2022, Tagle, and the entire Caritas board were dismissed due to an external investigation. Tagle has been chairman for the Episcopal Commission on the Doctrine of Faith of the Philippines since 2003. Tagle is the Professor of Dogmatic Synthesis at the Graduate School of Theology of San Carlos Seminary, the archdiocesan major seminary of Manila, and an associate professor of Systematic Theology at the Loyola School of Theology of Ateneo de Manila University. He also taught at the school of theology of the Divine Word Seminary in Tagaytay.
Tagle served from 1995 to 2001 as one of more than 50 members of the editorial board of the five-volume, 2,500-page History of Vatican II. Completed after discussions at 14 international conferences with contributions from over 100 scholars, it is seen as the seminal work on the Second Vatican Council. Its principal editors, Alberto Melloni and Giuseppe Alberigo, are identified with the Bologna School of ecclesiastical history which views the Second Vatican Council as a "rupture" with the past. Tagle's contribution, written in 1999 when he was not yet a bishop, was a 66-page chapter in the fourth volume of the History called "A November Storm: The 'Black Week which covered the final days of the council's third session in 1964, when several actions by Pope Paul VI caused alarm among reform forces.
Tagle's work has been criticized from opposite viewpoints. In 2005, Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, Secretary of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerants, a "continuity" advocate, assessed Tagle's chapter as "a rich and even comprehensive study", but called it "unbalanced, journalistic, and lacking objectivity expected of a true historian". Hans Küng, a principal critic of Pope Paul's conservative impact on the council, endorsed Tagle's view that the Roman Curia's influence on the Pope forced the Council documents to make "theological compromises", but said Tagle was unable to develop an explanation or justification for Pope Paul's positions, so that "in the closing section his writing degenerates into sanctimoniousness".
John L. Allen Jr., a Vaticanologist, reported that Cardinal Marc Ouellet (the Holy See's prefect for the Congregation for Bishops and protégé of Pope Benedict XVI) maintains his "full support" for Tagle. Allen also reported that a Vatican official indicated that he read Tagle's 1999 essay—after media reports highlighted it—and found nothing objectionable. In fact, he was impressed by Tagle's defense of Paul VI in that Tagle wrote that Paul followed a strategy of "listening to all views, especially opposing ones", and was willing to "sacrifice his personal popularity to save the council and its future". This official also said that it is difficult to suggest Tagle is opposed to Pope Benedict's reading of the council since one of the sources Tagle cited was the writings of Joseph Ratzinger. The Vatican news analyst Sandro Magister reported that Tagle's identification with the Bologna School would have hurt his chances of becoming a bishop had the members of the Congregation for Bishops – who considered Tagle's candidacy for archbishop – known of it when considering his appointment.
Conclusion
Luis Antonio Tagle's net worth and career are reflective of his influential role in the Catholic Church. While his financial wealth is modest compared to secular leaders, his impact on the religious community is profound. His dedication to the Church and his progressive views have made him a respected figure globally.