Francesco Borgongini Duca

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Styles of Francesco Cardinal Borgongini Duca
Reference style	His Eminence
Spoken style	Your Eminence
Informal style	Cardinal
See	none

Francesco Cardinal Borgongini Duca (February 26, 1884—October 4, 1954) was an Italian prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Apostolic Nuncio to Italy from 1929 to 1953, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1953 by Pope Pius XII.

[edit] Biography

Francesco Borgongini Duca was born in Rome, and studied at the Pontifical Roman Seminary, from where he obtained his doctorates in theology and in canon and civil law. He was ordained to the priesthood on December 22, 1906, and then taught theology at both the Pontifical North American College and the Pontifical Urbanian Athenaeum De Propaganda Fide from 1907 to 1909. He was favorably impressed by a young American seminarian named Francis Spellman^[1], whom Duca would later assist in consecrating as auxiliary bishop of Boston in 1932^[2].

Duca entered the service of the Roman Curia upon being made an official of the Apostolic Penitentiary in 1909, of which he became Secretary on February 24, 1917. He was raised to the rank of Privy Chamberlain of His Holiness on March 2, 1917, and was named Pro-Secretary of the Sacred Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs on June 28, 1921, rising to become full Secretary on October 14, 1922 (the Pope was the nominal head of that dicastery). He was made an Domestic Prelate of His Holiness (July 7, 1921) and apostolic protonotary (January 11, 1927) before being named to the commission to negotiate the Lateran Treaty.

On June 7, 1929, Duca was appointed Titular Archbishop of Heraclea in Europa by Pope Pius XI. He received his episcopal consecration on the following June 29 from Pietro Cardinal Gasparri, with Archbishop Carlo Cremonesi and Bishop Agostino Zampini, OSA, serving as co-consecrators, in the Hall of Benedictions at St. Peter's Basilica. Duca was named Apostolic Nuncio to Italy, the first after the Lateran Treaty, the next day, on June 30. In addition to his diplomatic duties, he was also made pontifical administrator of the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls on April 1, 1933, and of the Basilica of Our Lady of Loreto on March 25, 1934.

In early 1937, he bestowed the Golden Rose to Queen Elena of Italy, on the occasion of her fortieth wedding anniversary to Victor Emmanuel III^[3]. During World War II, Benito Mussolini clashed with Duca over the issue of restricting Jewish converts to Catholicism^[4]. In 1952, he wrote The Seventy Weeks of Daniel and the Messianic Date, in which he determined the date of Christ's crucifixion as April 7, 30 AD, by using the cryptographic prophecies contained in the Book of Daniel^[5]. Pope Pius XII created him Cardinal Priest of S. Maria in Vallicella in the consistory of January 12, 1953, ceasing to serve as Nuncio on that same date.

Cardinal Duca from a heart ailment^[6] died at his apartment in the Palace of the Holy Office in Rome at 9:50 a.m., at age 70, having also received Extreme Unction. He was initially buried in the chapel of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, but his remains were later transferred to the church of San Salvatore in Ossibus in Vatican City.

[edit] References

1. ^ TIME Magazine. America in Rome February 25, 1946
2. ^ TIME Magazine. Crosier & Mitre September 19, 1932
3. ^ TIME Magazine. Laetare Sunday March 15, 1927
4. ^ Shoah Rose. Papal Nuncios of 1933-1945: Ambassadors of the Vatican in the Shoah
5. ^ TIME Magazine. Milestones October 18, 1954
6. ^ Ibid.

[edit] External links

• Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church
• Catholic-Hierarchy