religion brian farrell 
Brian Farrell L . C . ( b . 8 February 1944 ) is an Irish ___MASK30___ bishop and currently Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity . Within the Council he is Vice - President of the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews . Bishop Farrell was born in Dublin , Ireland . He joined the Legion of Christ in 1961 and was ordained a priest on 26 November 1969 at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Rome . From 1970 to 1976 he was the novice director in the Legionary seminary in Orange , Connecticut . He obtained his licentiate in philosophy at the Pontifical Gregorian University and his licentiate in theology at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas , and in 1981 earned a doctorate in dogmatic theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University . From 1981 to 2002 he served the Vatican ' s Secretariat of State , from 1999 as head of the English desk in the Office of General Affairs . On 19 December 2002 he was appointed Titular Bishop of the titular see of Abitinae under Cardinal Walter Kasper and was named Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity . He was consecrated Bishop of Abitinae on 6 January 2003 by Pope John Paul II ; his principal co - consecrators were Archbishops Leonardo Sandri and Antonio Maria Vegliò . In 2003 Bishop Farrell contributed an article to the catalogue for `` The Tension of Origin , '' an exhibition of works by Italian artist Giovanni Bonaldi which engaged in Jewish - Christian dialogue through artistic expression . In 2010 Bishop Farrell was one of four advisors to Archbishop Velasio De Paolis during his task as Papal Delegate to the Congregation of the Legionaries of Christ , and assisted him in fulfilling his duties in the reorganisation of the Mexican congregation . In 2015 he ordained twenty new Legionaries of Christ deacons . Bishop Farrell is the older brother of Kevin Farrell , currently Bishop of Dallas . The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council ( more commonly known as the Second Vatican Council , or informally as Vatican II ) addressed relations between the ___MASK94___ and the modern world . It was the twenty - first and most recent ecumenical council of the ___MASK94___ and the second to be held at St . Peter ' s Basilica in the Vatican . The council , through the Holy See , formally opened under the pontificate of Pope John XXIII on 11 October 1962 and closed under Pope Paul VI on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception on 8 December 1965 . The Pontifical Council for Promoting ___MASK52___ Unity ( PCPCU ) origins are associated with the Second Vatican Council which met intermittently from 1962  1965 .