Pope Leo XIV has replaced Cardinal Konrad Krajewski as the head of the Vatican’s principal charitable office, appointing the Spanish Augustinian Bishop Luis Marín de San Martín as the new Almoner of His Holiness and Prefect of the Dicastery for the Service of Charity.
Announced at midday by the Holy See Press Office on 12 March, the brief Vatican bulletin stated: “The Holy Father has appointed Bishop Luis Marín de San Martín, OSA, titular bishop of Suliana and currently under-secretary of the General Secretariat of the Synod, as Almoner of His Holiness and Prefect of the Dicastery for the Service of Charity, conferring on him the dignity of archbishop.”
The decision means that Cardinal Krajewski, who has served in the role since 2013 and became the first prefect of the dicastery following the Roman Curia reforms of 2022, no longer leads the office.
The move brings to a close more than a decade in which Cardinal Krajewski became one of the most visible symbols of Pope Francis’s era. When Francis first appointed him papal almoner in August 2013, shortly after the beginning of his pontificate, the Polish prelate was given a mandate that the Pope himself described in practical terms. According to Krajewski, the Pope told him at the outset: “You can sell your desk. You don’t need it. You need to get out of the Vatican. Don’t wait for people to come ringing. You need to go out and look for the poor.”
The papal almoner acts in the name of the Pope to carry out works of charity and to respond to requests for assistance addressed directly to the Holy Father. Appeals sent to the Pope are frequently passed to the almoner, sometimes accompanied by handwritten notes from the Pope indicating that help should be given.
The office also raises money to fund these charitable activities. One of its traditional sources of income is the issuing of papal blessing parchments, decorative certificates bearing a photograph of the Pope and an inscription in calligraphy commemorating occasions such as weddings, baptisms or priestly ordinations. The proceeds from these parchments are directed entirely towards charitable projects. In earlier years the office handled thousands of requests annually and distributed significant sums in assistance.
Under Cardinal Krajewski the papal almonry frequently undertook visible acts of mercy that mirrored the pastoral priorities of the Francis pontificate. The cardinal was known for personally visiting the elderly and the homeless in Rome, distributing aid and organising practical assistance.
The institutional status of the papal almonry was elevated during the wider reform of the Roman Curia carried out by Pope Francis. In March 2022 the Pope promulgated the apostolic constitution Praedicate Evangelium, a restructuring of the Vatican’s central administration. The document, which came into force in June of that year, transformed the Office of the Papal Almoner into the Dicastery for the Service of Charity.
From that point the charitable office became one of the formal dicasteries of the Roman Curia, standing alongside the departments responsible for doctrine, bishops and evangelisation. Cardinal Krajewski continued to lead it, holding both the traditional title of papal almoner and the new position of prefect of the dicastery.
The appointment of Archbishop-designate Marín to lead an office that has acquired increased prominence in the Francis era will therefore be closely watched.
Born in Madrid on 21 August 1961, the new prefect belongs to the Order of St Augustine, the same order as the current Pope. He made his first religious profession in 1982 and his solemn vows three years later before being ordained to the priesthood in June 1988. His academic formation includes a doctorate in sacred theology from the Pontifical University of Comillas in Spain.
Within the Augustinian order he held a number of responsibilities, including serving as formator at the Tagaste Major Seminary in Los Negrales between 1996 and 1999 and later as provincial counsellor. From 2002 to 2008 he was prior of the monastery of Santa María de La Vid. He also taught theology in several Augustinian centres in Spain and served as a visiting lecturer at the Faculty of Theology of Northern Spain in Burgos.
His work eventually brought him to Rome, where from 2008 he served his order as archivist general, general assistant and president of the Institutum Spiritualitatis Augustinianae. The move to the Vatican came at the request of the Augustinian prior general, the then Fr Robert Prevost.
In February 2021 Pope Francis appointed him as one of the under-secretaries of the Synod of Bishops, working alongside the French religious sister Nathalie Becquart. At the same time he was named titular bishop of Suliana. His work in the synodal secretariat placed him within one of the central initiatives of the Francis pontificate, the global Synod on Synodality.
In previous comments to ACI Prensa the Spanish prelate emphasised that participation by the laity in the Church’s life must remain properly ordered within Catholic teaching. Speaking about the nature of the Church’s doctrine he stated that “the deposit of faith doesn’t change and cannot change”.
At the same time he has argued that greater involvement of lay Catholics in decision-making should be understood as a consequence of baptism rather than a concession. Lay people, he said, “must assume all the responsibility that corresponds to them, without laicising the clergy or clericalising the laity”.
Addressing the role of women in the Church, he has also pointed out that positions of responsibility within the Roman Curia can be held by lay people. “Nothing prevents women from holding office in the Roman Curia,” he said, noting that women already serve in several Vatican departments and that such participation could expand further.
The decision by Pope Leo to replace Cardinal Konrad Krajewski as prefect of the Dicastery for the Service of Charity is a small but revealing moment in the post-Francis Vatican.
Cardinal Krajewski had held the role since 2013. In the early months of Pope Francis’s pontificate he became one of the most recognisable figures of that era, embodying the Pope’s insistence that charity should be visible, personal and immediate.
The charitable office itself was elevated in 2022 when Francis promulgated Praedicate Evangelium, the constitution that reformed the Roman Curia. The traditional papal almonry was transformed into the Dicastery for the Service of Charity, placing it structurally alongside the other departments that administer the universal Church. Krajewski therefore became not only papal almoner but prefect of a curial dicastery.
The replacement of the cardinal raises questions. Cardinal Krajewski is only 62, well below the age at which curial officials ordinarily step down, and he has now been sent to the Archdiocese of Łódź. Bishop Luis Marín de San Martín, until now an under-secretary of the Synod of Bishops, will assume the post and be raised to the rank of archbishop. Nothing has been said about whether the change followed a request from the cardinal himself or whether it represents a direct decision of the Pope.
Such abrupt transitions are uncommon in the Roman Curia, particularly when they involve a relatively young cardinal whose term has not reached its natural conclusion. For that reason the appointment inevitably invites interpretation. It should not, however, be misread as a victory for one faction within the Church over another. Those who hope to see a decisive break with the culture of the Francis era will find little encouragement in the choice of successor.
Bishop Marín has been deeply involved in the Vatican’s synodal structures. Since 2021 he has served as under-secretary of the Synod of Bishops, working closely with Cardinal Mario Grech during the lengthy Synod on Synodality. Selecting a figure from that environment to lead the Church’s principal charitable office appears to signal continuity.
The Spanish Augustinian has also expressed views that many Catholics would consider reassuring. His comments regarding the deposit of faith, and the desire not to see the laity clericalised, will likely reassure the conservative factions of the Church.
Yet it would be unwise to treat such statements as evidence of a decisive shift in direction. They represent the minimum affirmation of Catholic teaching expected from any bishop. The appointment of a synodal official to lead the dicastery responsible for charity suggests that those priorities continue to guide the thinking of the present pontificate.
The most prudent conclusion, at least for the moment, is that the appointment represents continuity with careful adjustment rather than any dramatic change. Bishop Marín’s promotion may be viewed within the Vatican as recognition of his service in the synodal secretariat.
