Víctor Manuel Fernández

He was born on 18 July 1962 in Alcira Gigena, in Córdoba Province. His father Emilio was a shopkeeper who supported Raúl Alfonsín, the radical political leader. Fernández entered the seminary in 1978.[2]

In the late 1990s, he followed the recommendation of the Archbishop of Buenos Aires Jorge Bergoglio and declined an invitation to head a theological institute in Bogotá.[2]

He headed the Faculty of Theology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina (CUA) when Cardinal Bergoglio nominated him to serve as its rector on 15 December 2009.[2] He took his oath of office on 20 May 2011,[3] when his designation received confirmation from the Congregation for Catholic Education, which had withheld its assent while Fernandez responded to objections to his appointment from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).[4] Bergoglio resented this questioning of his judgment and Fernández found the process itself disrespectful when he traveled to Rome only to have the CDF cancel a meeting at the last minute.[1] In July 2023, after his nomination as prefect, he stated the CDF "even investigated me"; he added that over the span of months he "clarified [his] true thinking [to the CDF] and everything was resolved serenely". Cardinal Gerhard Müller, who headed the CDF from 2012 to 2017, confirmed that the CDF had maintained a file on Fernández in the late 2000s due to concerns about his theology.[5]

Two months after Cardinal Bergoglio became Pope Francis, he named Fernández titular archbishop of Tiburnia on 13 May 2013,[6] and he received his episcopal consecration on 15 June 2013[7] in the Metropolitan Cathedral of Buenos Aires from the Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Mario Poli, with the Archbishop of Santa Fe José María Arancedo, the bishop of Río Cuarto, Eduardo Martín, the bishop of Quilmes, Carlos Tissera, and the Archbishop of Corrientes, Andrés Stanovnik, as consecrators.[8] Fernández wore a pectoral cross Francis sent him from Rome.[9] He was the first rector of the University to be made an archbishop.[4] As Francis' first Argentine episcopal appointment, it was seen as a rebuke to the Roman Curia with which Francis as Archbishop of Buenos Aires had an occasionally antagonistic relationship, especially with the attempt of some in Rome to block Fernández' appointment as rector of UCA in 2011.[1]

Pope Francis named him to the commission that drafted the concluding message (relatio) of the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family, held in October 2014.[10]

Francis named him a member of the Fourteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops in October 2015[11] and appointed him to the drafting committee for the final report to be submitted to the synod participants for their votes.[12]

On 17 December 2016, he was named a consultor to the Congregation for Catholic Education.[13]

He ended his tenure as rector of the CUA on 25 April 2018,[14] after completing the maximum two terms in that post.[1]

Following the election of Pope Francis, Fernandez was often mentioned as a candidate for an important post in the Roman Curia, such as head of the Congregation for Catholic Education or, more distantly, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.[15] Pope Francis named him Archbishop of La Plata on 2 June 2018 to succeed Héctor Rubén Aguer,[7] who had been in poor health for several years, had submitted his resignation as required on his 75th birthday just a week earlier, and was long identified as an opponent of Bergoglio within the Argentine Episcopal Conference.[1] Fernández said his program for the archdiocese would be "Evangelium gaudium, but seriously, not as a slogan", and that Francis has told him to look carefully at the archdiocesan seminary.[16] He was enthroned in his archdiocese on the following 16 June.[17]

On 1 July 2023, Pope Francis appointed him to succeed Cardinal Luis Ladaria Ferrer as prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) in mid-September.[18] He became the first Argentine Francis has named to a senior position in the Roman Curia.[19]

A "highly unusual"[20] letter written in Spanish[21] from Pope Francis to Fernández was published alongside the announcement of his appointment. It defined his mission, saying: "The dicastery over which you will preside in other times came to use immoral methods. Those were times when, rather than promoting theological knowledge, possible doctrinal errors were pursued. What I expect from you is certainly something very different".[18] The letter told Fernández to encourage theology aimed at "increasing intelligence and the transmission of the faith at the service of evangelization", noting that his life's work showed he knew how to "put theological knowledge in dialogue with the life of the holy People of God". It directed his attention here rather than to the DDF's new responsibility for clerical discipline and cases of sexual abuse.[18][20][22]

In a letter to the faithful of his archdiocese, Fernández said he initially declined the appointment because he did not feel "qualified or trained" to lead the dicastery's section responsible for child abuse, and relented when assured that the specialists in that section were capable of working independently.[23]

In an interview after his appointment, Fernandez said he opposed same-sex blessings but stated that those that did not create confusion should be affirmed.[24]

On 9 July 2023, Pope Francis announced he plans to make him a cardinal at a consistory scheduled for 30 September.[25] At that consistory he was made cardinal deacon of Santi Urbano e Lorenzo a Prima Porta.[26]