Mario Medina Balam

Mario Medina Balam was born on 19 January 1963 in the village of Abalá, Yucatán. He attended the Archdiocesan Seminary of Yucatán and was ordained a priest on 17 June 1987. He studied Moral Theology and Canon Law at the Universidad Pontificia de México, took a doctorate in Canon Law at Saint Paul University, Ottawa, in 1994-1996, and took a second doctorate in Theology and Ecclesiastical State Law at the Universidad Pontificia de México. He was parish vicar of San Francisco de Asís (1988-1989), of the Sacrario Metropolitano (1989-1990), of San Servacío, Valladolid (1990-1992), and of San Juan Bautista (1992-1993); he has been a professor at the Universidad Pontificia de México since November 1992 and professor of Canon Law there since 2002; he was Judicial Vicar of the Yucatán Ecclesiastical Tribunal from 2007 to 2010 and has been Judicial Vicar of the Archdiocese of Yucatán since 2010. Before his appointment he was Profesor Ordinario of the Faculty of Canon Law at the Universidad Pontificia de México, having directed more than 70 licentiate and doctoral theses in canon law.

On 11 February 2023 Francis appointed him auxiliary bishop of Yucatán, titular bishop of Pupiana, and he was consecrated bishop on 14 April 2023 at the Centro de Convenciones Yucatán Siglo XXI in Mérida, by Gustavo Rodríguez Vega, with Nuncio Joseph Spiteri and Jorge Carlos Patrón Wong as co-consecrators; in his own post-consecration message he called himself 'obispo auxiliar número dos', at the orders of Rodríguez Vega, walking together with 'monseñor Pedro, obispo auxiliar número uno' (Mena Díaz). In the CEM he holds no June 2023 commission or Yucatán-province Permanent Council role; for the triennium 2024-2027 he is a member of the Comisión de la UPM and Vicepresidente of the Consejo Jurídico Asesor de la CEM, under president Juan Pedro Juárez Meléndez. In his first-anniversary letter of 14 April 2024, written with Rodríguez Vega's permission, he wrote that the three bishops form a good team, that he had visited almost all the parishes, and that vocations are the main challenge, alongside alcoholism and drug addiction in families, migrants, tourist overpopulation, cenote contamination and garbage as a municipal responsibility. He officiated the December 2024 Anáhuac Cancún provincial bishops' meeting Mass, and he attended the 24 January 2026 funeral Mass for Pedro Pablo Elizondo Cárdenas in Cancún Cathedral. He was still auxiliary bishop of Yucatán at as_of, aged 63, turning 64 on 19 January 2027.

The shield description 'su símbolo de caridad' (Mena Díaz's words at the press conference) is symbolism description, not a motto, and no motto is asserted for him.