Pope Leo XIV named an Italian religious sister to head the Dicastery for Integral Human Development on Tuesday, the first woman the pontiff has appointed to a top leadership role in the Church’s central administrative and governing apparatus.
Sister Alessandra Smerilli was second-in-command in the office under the outgoing Cardinal Michael Czerny, a Jesuit appointed by Pope Francis, who will turn 80 in July.
Czerny had served in the dicastery first as a priest and then as a cardinal with special responsibilities for the dicastery’s section for migrants, before getting the top job in 2022.
The office Smerilli is now set to lead is responsible not only for migrants, but also for ecology and human development.
The Integral Human Development office was the first of the “super-dicastery” conglomerates created during the Francis era.
It combined the former Pontifical Councils for Justice and Peace, Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, Pastoral Assistance to Health Care Workers, and the humanitarian relief office called Cor Unum.
The 51-year-old Smerilli is a Salesian Sister of Don Bosco and a trained economist with a post-doctoral degree from in political economy and statistics from the Pontifical Faculty of Educational Sciences Auxilium.
Leo has also appointed Cardinal Fabio Baggio as “pro-prefect” of the dicastery
That move is move in keeping with Pope Francis’s decision to name Cardinal Ángel Fernández Artime as pro-prefect of the department that oversees religious orders when he named Italian Sister Simona Brambilla to lead the religious dicastery in January of last year.
The appointment of a pro-prefect who often countersigns orders of the prefect reflects an ongoing theological debate within the Church, one that has practical consequences for the organization and direction of power.
Women cannot receive the Sacrament of Holy Orders, which is required to exercise powers of governance in the Church, and prefects of dicasteries need to be able to give orders that those who receive them are bound to follow.
Source:
cruxnow.com
