Ricardo Ezzati Andrello (, ; born 7 January 1942) is an Italian-Chilean prelate of the Catholic Church. He was Archbishop of Santiago de Chile from December 2010 to March 2019 and has been a cardinal since February 2014. He previously served as Archbishop of Concepción. He headed the Episcopal Conference of Chile from 2010 to 2016.

Early life and education

Ricardo Ezzati was born in Campiglia dei Berici,

Vicenza Vicenza ( , ; ) is a city in northeastern Italy. It is in the Veneto region at the northern base of the ''Monte Berico'', where it straddles the Bacchiglione River. Vicenza is approximately west of Venice and east of Milan. Vicenza is a thr ...

, Italy. He immigrated to

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

in 1959 to enter the novitiate of the Salesians in

Quilpué Quilpué is a city and capital of the Marga Marga Province in central Chile's Valparaíso Region. It is part of the Greater Valparaíso metropolitan area. It is widely known as "City of the Sun" (''Ciudad del Sol'') and the urban part of it als ...

Valparaíso Valparaíso (; ) is a major city, seaport, naval base, and educational centre in the commune of Valparaíso, Chile. "Greater Valparaíso" is the second largest metropolitan area in the country. Valparaíso is located about northwest of Santiago ...

, and studied philosophy at the Catholic University of Valparaíso. He studied theology at the Pontifical Salesian University in Rome, where he obtained his licentiate. He made his final vows as a Salesian on 30 December 1966 and was ordained as a priest of the Salesian order on 18 March 1970. After his ordination he received a Licentiate in Religious Studies at the Institut de Pastoral Catéchetique in Strasbourg. He then held the title of Professor of Religion and Philosophy at the Catholic University of Valparaíso.

Priesthood

As a Salesian priest he held the following positions: Director for Youth Ministry in the Salesian School in Valdivia; Director of Community for the Salesians in Concepcion, Chile; Member of the Provincial Council of the Chilean Salesians; Director of the Salesian Seminary of Santiago de Chile; and Inspector Provincial of the Salesians in Chile. He was a member of the Faculty of Theology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and Vice President of the Conference of Religious of Chile, participating in the General Chapters of the Salesian Congregation in 1984 and 1990.

Episcopate

In 1991, he was appointed to the Roman Curia as an official of the

Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life The Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, formerly called Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life (CICLSAL; la, Congregatio pro Institutis Vitae Consecratae et Soci ...

. On 28 June 1996,

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

appointed him Bishop of

Valdivia Valdivia (; Mapuche: Ainil) is a city and commune in southern Chile, administered by the Municipality of Valdivia. The city is named after its founder Pedro de Valdivia and is located at the confluence of the Calle-Calle, Valdivia, and Cau-Cau R ...

, Chile, and he was consecrated on 8 September. Archbishop Ricardo Ezzati at Installation

On 10 July 2001, Pope John Paul II appointed him Auxiliary Bishop of the much larger

Archdiocese of Santiago de Chile The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Santiago de Chile ( la, Archidioecesis Sancti Iacobi in Chile) is one of the five Latin Metropolitan sees of the Roman Catholic Church in Chile. Ecclesiastical province Its Suffragan sees are: * Roman Catholic D ...

, assigning him the

titular see A titular see in various churches is an episcopal see of a former diocese that no longer functions, sometimes called a "dead diocese". The ordinary or hierarch of such a see may be styled a "titular metropolitan" (highest rank), "titular archbis ...

of La Imperial. On 27 December 2006, he was named Archbishop of Concepción. In June 2009,

Pope Benedict XVI Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the soverei ...

named him and four other prelates to serve as Apostolic Visitors to the

Legionaries of Christ The Congregation of the Legionaries of Christ ( la, Congregatio Legionariorum Christi; abbreviated LC; also Legion of Christ) is a Roman Catholic clerical religious order made up of priests and candidates for the priesthood established by Marci ...

following the discovery that the order's founder, Marciel Maciel Degollado, an associate of

, had engaged in sexual abuse of minors and young men. Ezzati was given responsibility for investigating the order in South America: Chile, Argentina, Colombia, Brazil and Venezuela, where the Legion had 20 houses, 122 priests and 122 religious seminarians. While archbishop of Concepción, Ezzati mediated a dispute between the government and a group of 34

Mapuche The Mapuche ( (Mapuche & Spanish: )) are a group of indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina, including parts of Patagonia. The collective term refers to a wide-ranging ethnicity composed of various groups who s ...

prisoners who had been on a

hunger strike A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...

for 82 days. On 15 December 2010, Pope Benedict appointed Ezzati as Archbishop of Santiago de Chile to replace Cardinal Francisco Errázuriz, who had submitted his resignation as required upon reaching the age of 75. Ezzati was installed in Santiago de Chile on 14 January 2011.

Pope Francis Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013. ...

named Ezzati a member of the

Congregation for Catholic Education , type = Congregation , seal = Coat of arms Holy See.svg , seal_size = 100px , seal_caption = Coat of arms of the Holy See , logo = , picture =Via della Conciliazione din Roma1.jpg , picture_caption = Palazzo delle Congregazioni in Piazza ...

in November 2013. He was elevated to the rank of cardinal at a

consistory Consistory is the anglicized form of the consistorium, a council of the closest advisors of the Roman emperors. It can also refer to: *A papal consistory, a formal meeting of the Sacred College of Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church * Consistor ...

on 22 February 2014. In May 2014, Pope Francis named him a member of the

Pontifical Commission for Latin America The Pontifical Commission for Latin America is a department of the Roman Curia that since 1958 has been charged with providing assistance to and examining matters pertaining to the Catholic Church in Latin America. The Commission operates under t ...

. In October 2014, Ezzati denied press reports that he had denounced the Jesuit priest Felipe Berríos to the Vatican and said he had only replied to inquiries about the priest's controversial statements from the papal nuncio. Press reports later demonstrated that Ezzati had initiated the accusation process to prevent Berríos from becoming chaplain at the presidential palace. He participated in the Synod of Bishops on the Family in October 2014 and October 2015. He was one of the four prelates who presented the 2014 synod's summary document (the ''relatio''). He served as president of the Episcopal Conference of Chile from 2010 to 2016. In December 2016, Ezzati submitted his resignation as required upon reaching the age of 75. Pope Francis did not accept it. In May 2018, Ezzati submitted it again. On 22 March 2019, the Supreme Court of Chile rejected Ezzati's petition to stop the preliminary proceedings against him and not to bring in an accusation against him. One day later, Pope Francis accepted the submitted resignation.

Karadima case scandal

In February 2011, he announced that the

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) is the oldest among the departments of the Roman Curia. Its seat is the Palace of the Holy Office in Rome. It was founded to defend the Catholic Church from heresy and is the body responsible ...

, based on an investigation conducted under his predecessor, had found

Fernando Karadima The case of Fernando Karadima concerned the sexual abuse of minors in Chile, which became public in 2010. It raised questions about the responsibility and complicity of several Chilean bishops, including some of the country's highest-ranking Cath ...

, a prominent priest in the archdiocese, guilty of sexually abusing minors. In 2013 and 2014, he teamed with his predecessor, Cardinal Errazuriz, on a secret campaign to prevent Juan Carlos Cruz, one of Karadima's victims and accusers, from being appointed to the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors. The revelation of their email correspondence in September 2015 prompted advocates for victims of abuse to call for Ezzati's resignation. Includes the full text of several email messages. In January 2015, Pope Francis named Bishop

Juan Barros Madrid Juan de la Cruz Barros Madrid (born 15 July 1956) is a Chilean prelate of the Catholic Church. He was Bishop of Osorno from 2015 to 2018. He was Auxiliary Bishop of Valparaíso from 1995 to 2000, Bishop of Iquique from 2000 to 2004, and Milit ...

to head a diocese. Barros was closely associated with Karadima and continued to defend him. Ezzati's advice that the appointment be withdrawn was not accepted.

Ongoing lawsuit

On October 21, 2018, reports surfaced that Chile's Court of Appeal ordered Ezzati's office to pay 450 million Chilean pesos ($650,000) to three men who claimed that Karadima had sexually abused them for decades. However, Dobra Lusic, a spokesperson for the Court of Appeal, stated that the lawsuit was still ongoing and that no verdict had been reached.

Resignation amid new lawsuit

A man filed a $500,000 lawsuit against Ezzati and the Archdiocese of Santiago claiming that in 2015 he had been raped in a bedroom attached to the cathedral and that Ezzati had bribed him to keep silent. On 23 March 2019, Pope Francis accepted Ezzati's resignation, presented when he turned 75.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ezzati Andrello, Ricardo Living people 1942 births Salesians of Don Bosco 20th-century Roman Catholic bishops in Chile 21st-century Roman Catholic archbishops in Chile Salesian Pontifical University alumni Italian emigrants to Chile Roman Catholic archbishops of Santiago de Chile Cardinals created by Pope Francis Chilean cardinals Salesian cardinals People from Vicenza Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso alumni Members of the Congregation for Catholic Education Members of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America Ecclesiastical passivity to Catholic sexual abuse cases Naturalized citizens of Chile Roman Catholic archbishops of Concepción Roman Catholic bishops of Valdivia