His Eminence Francis Eugene Cardinal George, O.M.I., eighth Archbishop of Chicago, was born in Chicago to Francis J. and Julia R. McCarthy George on January 16, 1937. He is the first native Chicagoan to serve as Archbishop of Chicago.

After attending St. Pascal Grade School on Chicago’s northwest side and St. Henry Preparatory Seminary in Belleville, Illinois, he entered the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate on August 14, 1957.

He studied theology at the University of Ottawa, Canada, and was ordained a priest by Most Rev. Raymond Hillinger on December 21, 1963 at St. Pascal Church.

Cardinal George earned a master’s degree in philosophy at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. in 1965 and a doctorate in American philosophy at Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana, in 1970. In 1971, he received a master’s degree in theology from the University of Ottawa in Canada. During those years, he also taught philosophy at the Oblate Seminary, Pass Christian, Mississippi (1964-69), Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana (1968) and at Creighton University, Omaha, Nebraska (1969-1973).

From 1973-74 he was Provincial Superior of the Midwestern Province for the Oblates in St. Paul, Minnesota. He was then elected Vicar General of the Oblates and served in Rome from 1974-1986.

He returned to the United States and became coordinator of the Circle of Fellows for the Cambridge Center for the Study of Faith and Culture in Cambridge, Massachusetts (1987-1990). During that time, he obtained a Doctorate of Sacred Theology in ecclesiology from the Pontifical Urban University, Rome, Italy (1988).

Pope John Paul II appointed him Bishop of Yakima on July 10, 1990. He was ordained and installed as the fifth bishop of Yakima on September 21, 1990 in St. Paul Cathedral, Yakima.

He served there for five and a half years before being appointed Archbishop of Portland in Oregon by Pope John Paul II on April 30, 1996. He was installed on May 27, 1996 as the ninth Archbishop of Portland.

Less than a year later, on April 8, 1997, Pope John Paul II named him the eighth Archbishop of Chicago, to the See left vacant by the death of Joseph Cardinal Bernardin on November 14, 1996. His installation by the Most Rev. Agostino Cacciavillan, Apostolic Pro-Nuncio, took place at Holy Name Cathedral on May 7, 1997.

On January 18, 1998, Pope John Paul II announced Archbishop George’s elevation to the Sacred College of Cardinals. After the Consistory of February 21, 1998, Cardinal George was also appointed a member of the Holy See’s Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and for Societies of Apostolic Life, and the Pontifical Council “Cor Unum.” In 1999, Pope John Paul II appointed Cardinal George to the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and the Pontifical Commission for the Cultural Heritage of the Church. In 2001, the Pope appointed him to the Congregation for Oriental Churches and, in 2004, he appointed Cardinal George to the Pontifical Council for Culture.

He was a papal appointee to the 1994 World Synod of Bishops on Consecrated Life and a delegate and one of two special secretaries at the Synod of Bishops for America in 1997. He was a delegate of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to the 2001 World Synod of Bishops. He was also elected to the Council for the World Synod of Bishops in 2001.

He is Vice-President of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and a member of the USCCB Committee on Liturgy and the ad hoc Committee on Shrines. He also serves as consultant to the USCCB Committees on Doctrine and Pro-Life Activities and the Subcommittee on Lay Ministry. Previously, he served on the USCCB Committees on Doctrine, on Latin America, on Missions, on Religious Life, the American Board of Catholic Missions, and on World Missions; on the ad hoc Committee to Oversee the Use of the Catechism and the Subcommittee on Campus Ministry.

He was chair of the USCCB Commission for Bishops and Scholars from 1992-1994, and of the USCCB Committee on Liturgy from 2001-2004, and a consultant to the USCCB Committees on Evangelization (1991-93), Hispanic Affairs (1994-97), Science and Values (1994-97), and African American Catholics (1999-2002).

He is the USCCB Representative to the International Commission on English in the Liturgy (since 1997). He is also the Chancellor of the Catholic Church Extension Society (since 1997) and the University of St. Mary of the Lake, Mundelein, Illinois (since 1997). He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Catholic University of America (since 1993), a Trustee of the Papal Foundation (since 1997), a member of the Board of Directors of the National Catholic Bio-ethics Center in Boston (since 1994), and a member of the Board of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception (since 1997). He has been the Episcopal Liaison to the Catholic Campus Ministry Association Executive Board since 1998 and is now also Episcopal Moderator for the Ministry of Transportation Chaplains (2003). He also served as Episcopal Advisor to the Cursillo Movement, Region XII, from 1990 to 1997.

Since 1990, he has been Episcopal Moderator and member of the board of the National Catholic Office for Persons with Disabilities. He brings personal experience to his role after a five-month bout with polio at age 13 left him with permanent damage to his legs.

Cardinal George is Conventual Chaplain ad honorem of the Federal Association of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, Grand Prior of the North Central Lieutenancy of the United States for the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, and a member of the Kohl McCormick Early Childhood Teaching Awards Advisory Board. He has been a member of the Board of Directors of Oblate Media, Belleville, Illinois, since 1988.

He is publisher of The Catholic New World and Chicago Catolico, the official newspapers of the Archdiocese of Chicago. He writes a column frequently in The Catholic New World. He is also interviewed monthly on “Catholic Community of Faith,” a radio program sponsored by the Archdiocese on WSCN 820-AM, and he is on the Chicago Loop Cable Ch. 25 program “The Church, The Cardinal and You.”

As Archbishop of Chicago, he has issued two pastoral letters: on evangelization, “Becoming an Evangelizing People,” (November 21, 1997) and on racism, “Dwell in My Love” (April 4, 2001).

He is a member of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, the American Society of Missiologists and the Catholic Commission on Intellectual and Cultural Affairs. In addition to English, he speaks French, Italian, Spanish and some German.