Pope Francis announced that he would soon declare Saint Irenaeus of Lyon a doctor of the Church with the title of Doctor unitatis [doctor of unity, in Latin]. The Pope said this during an October 7 speech to a group of Catholic and Orthodox theologians, the Saint Irenaeus Joint Orthodox–Catholic Working Group.
The Working Group's annual session was organized this year for the first time in Rome. The Pope thanked them for their theological work in the service of communion between Catholics and Orthodox.
Pope Francis gave the saint from the East who came to exercise his ministry in the West as an example of a “spiritual and theological bridge.”
He said:
A request from Cardinal Barbarin
In January 2018, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Primate of the Gauls, on a trip to Rome, asked Pope Francis to make Saint Irenaeus a doctor of the Church.
Currently, the Church has 36 Doctors of the Church, including four women.
Pope Francis has only named one other doctor: Gregory of Narek (circa 954-circa 1010), a poet and philosopher of Armenia. He was proclaimed a doctor of the Church by Pope Francis in 2015.
