Angelo Felici

Angelo Felici J.C.D. (July 26, 1919 in Segni, province of Frosinone - June 17, 2007 in Rome) was an Italian Cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church and President of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei. Before this role he served as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints from 1988 to 1995.

Early life

He was ordained on 4 April 1942 and spent the next three years studying for his doctorate in canon law. In 1945 he joined the Vatican Secretariat of State where he worked until 1949. He was a faculty member at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy, until he was appointed under-secretary of the Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs in 1964.

Episcopate

Pope Paul sent him on a mission to Jerusalem after the Six-Day War between Arabs and Israelis. Pope Paul VI appointed him as titular archbishop of Cesariana and appointed pro-nuncio to the Netherlands on 22 July 1967. He was consecrated as a bishop in September of the same year. His nine years in Holland were known for their sharp conflicts within the Catholic Church, among other things about the celibacy issue and about two bishop's nominations that were supposed to be extremely conservative (Adrianus Johannes Simonis and Joannes Gijsen). He was transferred to Portugal in 1976 and finally to France in 1979.

Cardinalate

He was created and proclaimed Cardinal-Deacon of Santi Biagio e Carlo ai Catinari in the consistory of 28 June 1988 by Pope John Paul II. In 1988, he was appointed Prefect of...
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