Lorenzo Baldisseri

Lorenzo Baldisseri was born in Barga, Tuscany, on 29 September 1940 and ordained a priest for Pisa at twenty-two, on 29 June 1963. He holds a doctorate in canon law — his thesis on “The Nunciature in Tuscany” — and is a pianist trained at the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music. He entered the Holy See's diplomatic service in December 1973, serving in Guatemala, Japan, Brazil, Paraguay, France, and Zimbabwe. Appointed titular Archbishop of Diocletiana and nuncio to Haiti on 15 January 1992 — the country had just suffered a coup — he was consecrated on 7 March by Cardinal Sodano, and later served as nuncio to Paraguay (1995), India and Nepal (1999), and Brazil (2002), where he negotiated the landmark agreement regulating the Church's juridical status in Brazil, a model for other faiths.

In 2012 Benedict XVI made him Secretary of the Congregation for Bishops and of the College of Cardinals — in that role he was secretary of the 2013 conclave, at whose end the newly elected Pope Francis gave Baldisseri his own red zucchetto, the traditional signal of a coming cardinalate. On 21 September 2013 Francis appointed him Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops, a post he held through the 2014 and 2015 Synods on the Family and until 15 September 2020. He was created a cardinal on 22 February 2014, with the deaconry of Sant'Anselmo all'Aventino. His motto is Itinere Laete Servire Domino — “serve the Lord joyfully.”