Mario Francesco Pompedda
Mario Francesco Cardinal Pompedda ( born April 18, 1929 in Ozieri the province of Sassari, Italy, † October 17, 2006 in Rome ) was a Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.
Life
Mario Francesco Pompedda was a seminarian at the Almo Collegio Capranica and received after a study of Catholic theology and philosophy in 1951, the sacrament of Holy Orders. After further study he completed his PhD in the fields of law and Catholic theology and also earned a Licentiate in Biblical Theology. From 1955 he worked in various roles at the court of the Vatican, the Sacra Rota Romana. Pope Paul VI. appointed him on 8 May 1969 Auditor of the same Court.
On 13 September 1993, Pope John Paul II appointed as successor to Archbishop Ernesto Maria Fiore to the dean and as such, on 29 November 1997 on the Titular Archbishop of Bisarcio. He received his episcopal consecration the pope on January 6, 1998. On 16 November 1999, he was appointed Prefect of the Supreme Court of the Apostolic Signature. On 21 February 2001 it took John Paul II as a Cardinal deacon with the title Diakonia Annunciazione della Beata Vergine Maria a Ardeatina in the College of Cardinals to. Shortly after the completion of his 75th year of life be pre- attached for reasons of age resignation on 27 May 2004 was adopted. Pompedda was a participant at Conclave 2005, in which Benedict XVI. was chosen. From 2003 to 2006 he was Grand Prior of the Order of Constantine.
On October 17, 2006 Pompedda died in the Gemelli Hospital in Rome.
Work
Cardinal Mario Francesco Pompedda spoke out against equating gay marriage with the legal institution of marriage. At the same time, in a newspaper interview as a former head of the Vatican court he recognized the need to define a legal regime of de facto cohabiting homosexual couples in the state. In such a law, it could go to the property rights to pension entitlements and to succession matters. With these remarks, the cardinal pointed to a pioneering pragmatic approach of the Vatican with homosexual couples. In the past, even the Vatican had opposed legal recognition of homosexual couples over again.