Lluís Martínez Sistach, cardinal archbishop emeritus of Barcelona, will join the Royal European Academy of Doctors-Barcelona 1914 (RAED) as honorary academician during a ceremony to be held in Barcelona on 12 December. The recipient will read the entry speech “Laïcitat i laïcisme a l’occident europeu” (Different secularism in Western Europe). On behalf of the RAED will answer the full academician Francesc Torralba.
Doctor in Canonical and Civil Law, Martínez Sistach was ordained a priest in 1961. At the Pontifical Lateran University he obtained a doctor degree in 1967. In 1979, Cardinal Narcís Jubany appointed him vicar general of Barcelona. For two decades he was a professor of Canon Law at the Faculty of Theology of Catalonia. Between 1997 and 2004 he was president of the Tarraconense Episcopal Conference.
On November 13, 1987, Pope John Paul II appointed him Auxiliary Bishop of Barcelona and in 1991, Bishop of Tortosa. In 1997 John Paul II himself appointed him Metropolitan Archbishop of Tarragona and in 2004, Archbishop of Barcelona. He was the first Metropolitan Archbishop of Barcelona, since then this headquarters has had two suffragan dioceses. In 2007, Pope Benedict XVI announced his appointment as cardinal to take office a year later. He is a member of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, of the Supreme Court of the Apostolic Signatura and of the Prefecture of Economic Affairs of the Holy See.
