Spanish Father Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves, 60, is scheduled to take office in January 2020
November 14, 2019
Father Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves SJ (Society of Jesus)
Pope Francis has chosen a Jesuit priest as the Prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy of the Holy See.
Father Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves is scheduled to take office in January 2020. Normally the head of such a top Vatican office would also be named a bishop, but the Jesuit Superior General, Father Arturo Sosa, asked the pope not to elevate the new prefect to the episcopate so he could return to normal Jesuit ministry after his service in the Roman Curia.
The Secretariat for the Economy has been without a prefect since last year when its former head, Cardinal GeorgePell, was charged and found guilty on five counts of sexual assault on two minors.
Father Guerrero, 60, is the Delegate for Interprovincial Houses and Works of the Society of Jesus in Rome. He is also a General Councillor.
"As a Jesuit, it is a joy to receive a mission directly from the pope. It is a privileged way to realize my vocation," the newly named prefect told Vatican News.
"The obedience I profess has always led me along unexpected paths, led me where I would never have dared to venture. And so, I am grateful. Obedience is, for me, a privileged place of encounter with the Lord," he said.
Born in Merida, Spain, Father Guerrero entered the Society of Jesus in 1979 and was ordained a priest in 1992. He has degrees in economics, philosophy and theology and speaks Italian, English, French, Portuguese and Spanish.
In 2008 he was appointed as provincial of the Jesuit Province of Castilla in Spain that has over 600 Jesuits. In 2014 he was sent to Mozambique, serving as treasurer and project coordinator of the Jesuit mission there.
In 2017 he was sent to Rome as Delegate for the Interprovincial Roman Houses and Works - a position that oversees some 360 Jesuits and various ministries such as the Pontifical Gregorian University, The Pontifical Biblical Institute, The Pontifical Oriental Institute, the Vatican Observatory, La Civiltá Cattolica, Centro Aletti, the Russian College, the Bellarmino College, the Gesù College and the Communication Dicastery (Vatican Radio).
"This call was something completely unexpected. Initially, it filled me with anxiety, and I felt quite numb. But I welcome it with humility, with confidence in the Lord and in the team that is already working in the Secretariat for the Economy. I will collaborate in the service of this mission by offering the best of myself," Father Guerrero said.
"My desire is to get to know and to begin to work with the team at the Holy See's Secretariat for the Economy. I hope to contribute to the economic transparency of the Holy See, and to help to use efficiently the goods and resources that are at the service of the important evangelizing mission of the Church," he said.
Father Sosa, the Jesuit Superior General, expressed the joy of the Society of Jesus in its availability for service to the Pope and the Holy See.
Father Guerrero's appointment comes just one day after the High Court of Australia decided to hear a second appeal from Cardinal Pell, who in 2017 was found guilty of sexually abusing two choirboys in the 1990s.
Pell first took a leave of absence from his post as head of the Secretariat for the Economy to face his abuse charges in Australia in 2017.
His five-year term as prefect of that secretariat officially came to an end this past Feb. 24. That position had since been vacant until the new appointment of Father Guerrero.
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