Pope Francis has named a Spanish nun who served as a missionary in South Korea as undersecretary of a Vatican congregation. The Vatican announced the appointment of Sister Carmen Ros Nortes, a member of the Sisters of Our Lady of Consolation, as the new undersecretary of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. Born in southeast Spain on December 20, 1953, she earned degrees in theology, catechetical pedagogy and humanities, and obtained her licentiate in theology, specialising in Mariology, in Rome in 1985. She took her perpetual vows in 1986 and served her congregation in many ways, including as a missionary in South Korea, according to a Vatican statement. In 1992, she was hired to be an official at the Vatican Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. She also teaches at "Studium", the congregation's school of theology and law for consecrated life. The Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life has had a woman religious as undersecretary since 2004. According to statistics released by the Vatican in April 2017, the Catholic Church has more than 670,000 consecrated women and 188,000 religious order priests and brothers.