Archbishop of Québec
Cardinal Gérald Cyprien Lacroix, Metropolitan Archbishop of Quebec (Canada), was born on 27 July 1957 in Saint-Hilaire de Dorset in the archdiocese of Quebec. In 1965 he emigrated with his family to New Hampshire, United States. In 1975 he entered the Institut Séculier Pie X. He subsequently returned to Quebec, and in 1980 travelled to Colombia as a missionary. When he returned home, he decided to become a priest and in 1982 professed his perpetual vows and completed a bachelor of theology at the University of Laval. He was immediately appointed general secretary of the Pius X Secular Institute, an office he held until 1987. At the same time, he also served as director of the Centre for Christian Formation and Renewal in Quebec. He was ordained a priest on 8 October 1988 in the parish of Notre-Dame-de-la Recouvrance. He then returned to Colombia, where from 1990-1998 he served as a missionary in the archdiocese of Popayán, as a professor at the major seminary of San José, as a member of the diocesan pastoral council, presbyteral council, and commission for social media, and as director of the commission on the liturgy. In 2001, he was named director general of the Pius X Secular Institute and returned to Quebec where he served for two consecutive terms. He also served as president of the secretariat of the Saint-André school of evangelization in Canada and as a member of the executive council of the worldwide conference of secular institutes. He was appointed as titular Bishop of Ilta and auxiliary of Quebec on 7 April 2009 and received episcopal ordination on 24 May of the same year. On 22 February 2011 he was appointed Archbishop of Quebec. Appointed by Pope Francis he participated in the XIV Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops on The Vocation and Mission of the Family in the Church and Contemporary World (October 2015). Created and proclaimed Cardinal by Pope Francis in the Consistory of 22 February 2014, of the Title of San Giuseppe all’Aurelio (St. Joseph at Aurelio). On 7 March 2023 the Holy Father Francis, having to renew the Council of Cardinals upon the expiry of the mandate of the preceding one, has appointed Cardinal Lacroix as member of the new Council.