Royel Mar Awa

Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East, Iraq

(Chicago - United States, 1975)

Ordained a priest in 1999 and consecrated bishop of the Diocese of California in 2008, he is the first bishop of the Assyrian Church of the East to be born in the United States. On 8 September 2021, he was elected Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East and enthroned in Iraq, in Erbil, where the Patriarchal See is now located.
This ancient Church, whose seat has historically been in Baghdad, is present in Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, the Arabian Gulf, India, the United States and Australia. Divided into 19 dioceses, it counts some 330,000 faithful scattered around the world.