His Eminence Filipe Neri António Sebastião do Rosário Ferrão is an Indian Catholic prelate who has served as Archbishop of Goa and Daman since 2004. He was previously an auxiliary bishop of the same archdiocese from 1993 to 2004. Ferrão was created a cardinal by Pope Francis in 2022. Ferrão is the sixth prelate of Goan origin to attain the rank of cardinal and the first Archbishop of Goa and Daman to be a cardinal since an episcopal see was established there in 1557.
He was born on 20 January 1953 in Mapusa, Goa. After completing the Preparatory Course at the Minor Seminary of Our Lady, Saligao-Pilerne, Goa, he studied philosophy and theology at the Papal Seminary, Pune. He was ordained a priest in October 1979.
He thereafter studied at the Pontificia Universitas Urbaniana, obtaining a licentiate degree in Biblical Theology in 1988, and then in Brussels at the International Institute Lumen Vitae, earning a licentiate degree in catechetics and pastoral theology in 1991. Returning to Goa, he was the first director of the Diocesan Centre for Lay Apostolate from 1991 to 1994. He published booklets of daily scriptural reflections for the faithful. He also managed other religious assignments during this period.
Pope John Paul II appointed him auxiliary bishop of Goa and Daman and titular bishop of Vanariona in January 1994. He received his episcopal consecration on 10 April 1994 from Archbishop Raul Nicolau Gonçalves in the Se Cathedral in Old Goa.
On 16 January 2004, Pope John Paul named him Archbishop of Goa and Daman with the honorary title of Patriarch of the East Indies. He was installed as archbishop on 21 March 2004.
In November 2006, the Archdiocese of Goa and Daman was reorganized as a metropolitan archdiocese with a suffragan diocese and no longer directly subject to the Holy See. Pope Benedict XVI named Ferrão its first archbishop. On 29 May 2022, Pope Francis announced that he planned to make Ferrão a cardinal, and on 27 August 2022, he made him a cardinal priest, assigning him the title of Santa Maria in Via.
In February 2024, Ferrão was elected President of the Federation of Asian Bishops' Conferences. On 23 October 2024, the Synod of Bishops elected Ferrão a member of the Ordinary Council of the General Secretariat of the Synod.
*Collected from the public domain.
*Updated on 25/04/2025
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