ardinal Raymond Leo Burke, Patron emeritus of the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta,  was born on 30 June 1948 in Richland Center, Wisconsin, USA. He was the youngest of six children and attended high school and college at Holy Cross Seminary in La Crosse, Wisconsin, before becoming a Basselin scholar at the Catholic University of America in 1971.

He studied for the priesthood at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and was ordained a priest by Pope Paul VI on 29 June 1975 in St. Peter’s Basilica. After his ordination, he returned to La Cross and served as associate rector at the Cathedral of St. Joseph the Workman and taught religion at the Aquinas High School.

In 1980, he returned to Rome and earned a doctorate in canon law from the Pontifical Gregorian University. In 1984, he served as moderator of the curia and vice-chancellor of the diocese of La Crosse. In 1989, he was nominated defender of the bond of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura.

On 10 December 1994 he was appointed bishop of La Crosse and received episcopal ordination on 6 January 1995 in St. Peter’s Basilica.

On 2 December 2003 he was appointed Archbishop of Saint Louis.

On 27 June 2008 Pope Benedict XVI appointed him Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signature.

On 8 November 2014 Pope Francis nominated him Patron of the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta. He was Patron until 19 June 2023.

He participated in the conclave of March 2013, which elected Pope Francis.

Created and proclaimed Cardinal by Benedict XVI in the consistory of 20 November 2010, of the Title of Sant’Agata de’Goti (Saint Agatha of the Goths) Deaconry elevated pro hac vice to presbyteral title (3 May 2021).

Member of:

• Dicastery for the Causes of Saints;
• Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signature.