José Saraiva Martins

Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, CMF ( born January 6, 1932 in Gago do Jarmelo, Portugal) is a retired cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.

Life

José Saraiva Martins joined after leaving school in the Order of the Claretians. His theological studies, he finished with the licentiate at the Pontifical Gregorian University. On March 16, 1957 he was ordained priest. After further years of study in Rome, he earned a doctorate in theology at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas.

He then worked as a lecturer in metaphysics at the seminar of the Claretians in Marino, then as a professor of fundamental theology and doctrine of the sacraments on Claretianum and at the Pontifical University of Rome. In 1983 he was secretary of the sixth Annual General Meeting of the Synod of Bishops. On 26 May 1988, Pope John Paul II appointed Titular Archbishop of Thuburnica and Secretary of the Congregation for Catholic Education. He received his episcopal consecration Cardinal Agostino Casaroli on 2 July of the same year.

On May 30, 1998 John Paul II appointed him Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, and took him on 21 February 2001 as a cardinal deacon with the title of Nostra Signora del Sacro Cuore diakonia in the College of Cardinals to. Saraiva Martins took part in the conclave in 2005, from Benedict XVI. emerged as the Pope. This confirmed him shortly after his election in his capacity as Cardinal Prefect. The new pope returned to the earlier practice that beatification are regularly carried out not by himself, but by officers, meanwhile, mostly outside of Rome (about Franz Jägerstätter 2007 in Linz and Basile Moreau, 2007 in Le Mans). It took place under Martin 's direction, a beatification of 498 killed in the Spanish Civil War clergy, which represented the largest action of its kind and triggered a fierce political controversy in Spain.

On 9 July 2008, Pope Benedict XVI. by José Cardinal Saraiva Martins, the argument put forward on grounds of age resignation from the office of Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, Archbishop Angelo Amato and appointed as his successor. On 24 February 2009, he was named Benedict XVI. Cardinal Bishop of Palestrina.

Cardinal Saraiva Martins took because of the age limit not participate in the conclave of 2013.