Antuan Ilgit

Antuan Ilgit, S.J. (born 22 June 1972) is a Turkish-Italian prelate of the Catholic Church who has been an auxiliary bishop of the Vicariate of Anatolia since 2023. A member of the Jesuits, he has been vicar general and chancellor of that vicariate since 2022. He completed his priestly formation and education in Italy and the United States. His research focuses on bioethics and examines disability, sexual morality and interreligious dialogue with Islam.

Biography Antuan Ilgit was born on 22 June 1972 in Hersbruck, Germany, to a family of Turkish immigrants and raised a Muslim. His father was a fisherman and his mother a homemaker. Though fluent in several languages, he does not know German. Speaking of his Muslim heritage in 2010, he said: He celebrated his first Mass a week later at the Church of Saint Teresa of Lisieux in Ankara.

He earned a bachelor's degree in theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in 2008. He did a year of studies at the Pontifical Oriental Institute and obtained a licentiate in moral theology with a focus on bioethics at the Alphonsian Academy of the Pontifical Lateran University in 2011. He also assisted at St. Leonard's Parish in Boston's traditionally Italian North End neighborhood.

On 19 November 2022, he made his final vows as a Jesuit in Ankara. In July 2023, he led a group of Turkish students to participate in World Youth Day in Lisbon, where they met with Pope Francis. He has met Pope Francis on several other occasions, once serving as translator when the pope met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. He is the first Turk named a bishop since the papal nuncio Julio Murat in 2012.

He received his episcopal consecration on 25 November in the Basilica of St. Anthony of Istanbul.

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