19 march, 2025
Cardinal Jaime Spengler to Preside Over Pilgrimage to Fatima on 12 and 13 MayThe Metropolitan Archbishop of Porto Alegre is the head of the Brazilian episcopate and was created a Cardinal by Pope Francis in the Consistory of 7 December.
Cardinal Jaime Spengler, Metropolitan Archbishop of Porto Alegre in Brazil, will preside over the International Anniversary Pilgrimage to the Shrine of Fatima on 12 and 13 May. Monsignor Jaime Spengler was created Cardinal by Pope Francis in the Consistory of 7 December 2024. He is currently President of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (CNBB) and President of the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM). The Metropolitan Archbishop of Porto Alegre was born on 6 September 1960 in Gaspar, in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina. He was ordained a priest in his hometown on 17 November 1990, after a vocational journey in the Order of Friars Minor that began in 1982. He studied philosophy and theology in Brazil and Jerusalem and, after his priestly ordination, he took a doctorate in philosophy at the Pontifical University of Saint Anthony in Rome. In the Franciscan Order, he worked in various missions and cities in Brazil until 2010, when Pope Benedict XVI appointed him Auxiliary Bishop of Porto Alegre, where he was then consecrated Bishop on 5 February 2011. On 18 September 2013, Pope Francis appointed him Metropolitan Archbishop of Porto Alegre, and he took office on 15 November of the same year. In 2014, the Holy Father appointed him a member of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, and, in 2022, a member of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. On 11 January 2025, after his creation as a Cardinal, he joined the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, while remaining a member of the now designated Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. |
