Cardinal Matteo Maria Zuppi, Archbishop of Bologna, Italy, was born in Rome on 11 October 1955, the fifth of six children.

In 1973, while a student at the Virgilio Lyceum, he met Andrea Riccardi, the founder of the Community of Sant’Egidio, and began to visit the community and to collaborate in its activities of service to the disadvantaged: from popular schools for marginalised children from the slums of Rome, to initiatives for the elderly who are alone and not self-sufficient, for immigrants and the homeless, for the terminally ill and nomads, for the disabled and drug addicts, for prisoners and victims of conflict; to its ecumenical activities for Christian unity and its work in interreligious dialogue, which took shape in the Assisi meetings. At the age of 22, after graduating in Arts and Philosophy from the University of Rome “La Sapienza,” with a thesis on the history of Christianity, he entered the seminary of the suburban Diocese of Palestrina, after the course of preparation for the priesthood at the Pontifical Lateran University, where he obtained a bachelor’s degree in Theology.

He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Palestrina on 9 May 1981 in the Cathedral of Sant’Agapito martire by Bishop Renato Spallanzani. He was immediately appointed vicar to the parish priest of the Roman Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere, Monsignor Vincenzo Paglia. When Monsignor Paglia was elected bishop in 2000, it was only natural that “don Matteo,” as he is still known today, should take up the role of parish priest, which he held for ten years. Incardinated in Rome on 15 November 1988, he was also Rector of the church of Santa Croce alla Lungara from 1983 to 2012 and a member of the diocesan presbyteral council from 1995 to 2012. During his second five-year period as parish priest in Trastevere, from 2005 to 2010, he was also Prefect of the Third Prefecture of Rome, and from 2000 to 2012 he was General Ecclesiastical Assistant of the Community of Sant’Egidio, after having acted as a mediator in Mozambique, together with Riccardi, in the process that led to peace after more than seventeen years of bloody civil war.

Meanwhile, in 2010 he left the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere to begin his ministry as parish priest in the parish of Santi Simone e Giuda Taddeo a Torre Angela, one of the most populous parishes of the diocese, on the eastern outskirts of the city. Shortly afterwards, on 31 January 2012, Benedict XVI appointed him Titular Bishop of Villanova and Auxiliary of Rome.

On the following 14 April he was consecrated a bishop by the then-Cardinal Vicar Agostino Vallini, with Archbishop Giovanni Battista Pichierri and Bishop Vincenzo Paglia, now Archbishop, his predecessor as Parish Priest of Santa Maria in Trastevere and Ecclesiastical Assistant to the Community of Sant’Egidio.  He chose the motto Gaudium Domini fortitudo vestra and took over the pastoral care of the central sector.

On 27 October 2015, Pope Francis named him Archbishop of Bologna, succeeding Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, and he took possession of the Cathedral of Saint Petronius on 12 December of the same year. After convening the diocesan Eucharistic Congress, inaugurated on 13 November 2016, he received the Pope during his visit to the capital of Emilia Romagna on 1 October 2017.  A year later he took part in the fifteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, dedicated to young people.

On 22 May 2022, in accordance with art. 26 § 1 of the Statute of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, Pope Francis appointed Cardinal Zuppi, the Archbishop of Bologna, as President of the Conference.

He is the author of several pastoral publications.

On 2 June 2023 the Holy Father appointed Cardinal Zuppi Judge of the Supreme Court of Vatican City State, taking effect on 1 January 2024.

He was created and proclaimed Cardinal by Pope Francis in the Consistory of 5 October 2019, and was assigned the titular church Sant’Egidio.

Member of:

• Dicasteries: for Promoting Integral Human Development; for the Eastern Churches; for Evangelization, Section for Fundamental Questions of Evangelization in the World.
• Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See.