Sister Simona Brambilla (CNS / 2024)
By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has appointed Consolata Missionary Sister Simona Brambilla to be the first woman to lead a Vatican dicastery, naming her prefect of the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.
The 59-year-old Italian sister had served as secretary of the dicastery since October 2023.
The announcement of her appointment Jan. 6 also said Pope Francis named as pro-prefect of the dicastery Spanish Cardinal Angel Fernandez Artime, 64, the former rector general of the Salesians.
The Vatican press office did not reply to requests to explain why the cardinal was given the title pro-prefect or how his role would be different from that of a dicastery secretary.
Mercy Sister Sharon Euart, a canon lawyer and executive director of the Resource Center for Religious Institutes in Silver Spring, Maryland, told Catholic News Service, “The appointment of the pro-prefect recognizes that there may be situations that call for the exercise of (holy) orders such as liturgical functions with members of the dicastery and the Curia as well as individual situations involving the internal forum and the sacrament of reconciliation.”
“I do not think the appointment of the pro-prefect diminishes the role or authority of the prefect in carrying out the responsibilities” entrusted to the dicastery, she said in an email response to questions.
The dicastery, according to the apostolic constitution on the Roman Curia, is called “to promote, encourage and regulate the practice of the evangelical counsels, how they are lived out in the approved forms of consecrated life and all matters concerning the life and activity of Societies of Apostolic Life throughout the Latin Church.”
According to Vatican statistics, there are close to 600,000 professed women religious in the Catholic Church. The number of religious-order priests is about 128,500 and the number of religious brothers is close to 50,000.
When a vowed member of a religious order asks to leave or is asked by the community to leave, the decision must be approved by the dicastery. It also approves the establishment of new religious orders, approves the drafting or updating of the orders’ constitutions, oversees the merger or suppression of religious orders and monitors the formation of unions of superiors general.
Sister Brambilla succeeds 77-year-old Brazilian Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz, who has led the dicastery since 2011.
Born in Monza, Italy, Sister Brambilla earned a degree in nursing before entering the Consolata order in 1988. She studied psychology at Rome’s Pontifical Gregorian University, and in 1999, after taking her final vows, went to Mozambique where she did youth ministry before returning to Rome in 2002, earning her doctorate in psychology from the Gregorian University in 2008.
She served two terms as superior of the Consolata Missionary Sisters, leading the congregation from 2011 to May 2023.
