VATICAN CITY (RNS) — Pope Leo XIV announced a significant reshuffling of top Vatican posts on Monday (March 30), consolidating his leadership over the church and the Roman Curia almost one year into his pontificate.
Leo tapped Archbishop Paolo Rudelli, 55, formerly the papal representative in Colombia, to be substitute for general affairs at the Vatican Secretariat of State, the third highest ranking position at the Vatican, equivalent to the president’s chief of staff in the United States.
Rudelli will replace Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, a Venezuelan who was appointed by Pope Francis in 2018 and who will now serve as papal nuncio to Italy and the Republic of San Marino. The current nuncio, or papal representative, to Italy, Archbishop Petar Rajič, who was born in Canada to Croatian immigrants, will now serve Leo at the Vatican as prefect of the Papal Household, overseeing all the pope’s private and public meetings.
With these appointments, Leo is elevating career Vatican diplomats known for their quiet efficiency and low public profiles. Peña Parra became closely associated with the fallout from financial and governance crises that clouded Francis’ pontificate.
Born in northern Italy in 1970, Rudelli, an expert in moral theology and in canon law, studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. Like other Leo appointments, Rudelli spent much of his career at t …
