Pope Francis elevated him to the rank of cardinal in In , he received his Doctorate of Divinity under Karl Cardinal Lehmann for his thesis on the Protestant theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and a second doctorate in theology, qualifying him for a chair in , also under Lehmann on the theology of the "communion of saints.
He then served as a pastor of three parishes. On 17 January , he was also appointed as a member of the Pontifical Council for Culture. This must be overcome[;] we need to find a new and fundamental unity in the Church and individual countries. Unity in Christ, not a unity produced according to a program and later invoked by a partisan speaker.
We are not a community of people aligned to a party program, or a community of scientific research[;] our unity is gifted to us.
We believe in the one Church united in Christ. He said "Targeted discreditation campaigns against the Catholic Church in North America and also here in Europe have led to clerics in some areas being insulted in public. An artificially created fury is growing here which sometimes reminds one of a pogrom sentiment. Peter was no doubt an exception. Pope Francis is also more pastoral and our mission at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is to provide the theological structure of a pontificate.
He said that on the last working day of his five-year term, Pope Francis informed him "within a minute" that he would not be reappointed to another term. Just as he gave no reason for dismissing three highly competent members of the CDF a few months earlier.
