Eduardo Martínez Somalo

infobox cardinalstyles
cardinal name=Eduardo Cardinal Martínez Somalo
dipstyle=His Eminence
offstyle=Your Eminence
See=Thagora (titular see)|

Eduardo Martínez Somalo (born March 31, 1927) is a Spanish Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He was Chamberlain of the Roman Church, or Camerlengo, serving in that position until his 80th birthday. In the past he served as Prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life and of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in the Roman Curia. He was a close collaborator of Pope John Paul II.

Biography

Martínez Somalo was born in the small town of Baños de Río Tobía in La Rioja, Spain, and had five brothers and four sisters. He studied at the diocesan seminary of Logroño, the Pontifical Spanish College and the Pontifical Gregorian University (where he received a licentiates in theology and in canon law) in Rome. He was ordained to the priesthood on March 19, 1950 by Archbishop Luigi Traglia, and did pastoral and curial work in Calahorra. Returning to Rome to prepare to serve as a Vatican diplomat, he attended the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy (where he later taught as a professor) and obtained a doctorate in canon law in (1956) from the Pontifical Lateran University.

He then entered the Roman Curia, in the Secretariat of State; he later advanced to the head the Spanish section. He was elevated to the rank of Monsignor on May 14, 1970. Pope Paul VI appointed him Apostolic Nuncio to Colombia and elevated him to Titular Archbishop of Thagora. He received his episcopal consecration on December 13 1975, from Jean-Marie Villot, then Secretary of State, with Archbishop Giovanni Benelli and Bishop Francisco Álvarez Martínez serving as co-consecrators. In 1979 Pope John Paul II appointed him to the Secretariat of State.

In the consistory of June 28, 1988, he was created Cardinal Deacon of "SS. Nome di Gesù" by Pope John Paul II, and on July 1 of that year he was appointed to the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. He served as Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. He was Cardinal protodeacon from January 29, 1996 to January 9, 1999.

Somalo became Prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life on January 21, 1992, and was named Chamberlain of the Roman Church, or Camerlengo, on April 5, 1993, an office of special importance during vacancy of the Holy See. After serving ten years as a Cardinal Deacon, in 1999 he took the option of becoming a Cardinal Priest.

He retired on February 11, 2004, and participated as a Cardinal elector in the Papal conclave, 2005. He ceased to be Camerlengo on his 80th birthday, and was succeeded by Tarcisio Bertone, who also serves as Secretary of State.

External links

* [http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/letters/2007/documents/hf_ben-xvi_let_20070404_martinez-somalo_en.html letter to Cardinal Martínez Somalo from Pope Benedict on his resigantion as Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church]