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Arms of Cardinals
Just as papal arms have come to be distinguished by a unique, and once real, headdress, cardinals too have long had a distinctive hat -- the red galero. This is still the primary element in the arms of cardinals. The current regulations governing clerical arms proscribe that a cardinal's arms be shown with a red galero with 30 fiocchi (i.e. tassels) total, 15 on each side. A cardinal may also indicate his episcopal rank with the appropriate processional cross -- a double transverse cross if he is a patriarch, primate, or archbishop; a single transverse cross if he is a bishop. Cardinals who have not been consecrated bishops are not to display a processional cross. Cardinals, just like bishops and archbishops, are allowed to marshall their arms with those of their diocese if they are the resident ordinary.
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Archbishop of Galveston-Houston As an archbishop, Cardinal DiNardo uses a double transverse processional cross, and as a resident ordinary, marshalls his arms with those of the archdiocese. |
(1909-1979) Note the single transverse cross Cardinal Wright used as bishop of Pittsburgh before being moved to a curial office in Rome. |
Cardinal Albert Vanhoye Pope Benedict XVI waived the episcopal requirement for Cardinal Vanhoye, and thus as a priest he does not display a processional cross. |
Red galeros have been used by cardinals to indicate their rank since 1243. They only stopped being worn in 1969 when Pope Paul VI stopped granting galeros in consistory ceremonies, though in some cathedrals, it is still possible to find actual galeros hanging above the tombs of their former owners. Galeros were orginally only used heraldically by cardinals, but the practice quickly spread among lower ranking clergy who began using a green galero. The number of tassels for cardinals has fluctuated over time finally settling down at the current 30 by the seventeenth century.
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