Vatican City - Four cardinals currently heading Dicasteries of the Roman Curia have already turned 75 and, as required by the regulations, have submitted their resignations to Leo XIV. A fifth had his resignation accepted only a few days ago and was replaced shortly before his 80th birthday. By the end of August, an archbishop who is not a cardinal will also turn 75 and will therefore be required to submit his resignation.
During the first eighteen months of the pontificate of Francis’s successor, generational change at the top of the Roman Curia has become one of the clearest tests of Leo XIV’s style of government. It also offers an opportunity to clarify a body of rules which, through a succession of apostolic constitutions and regulations, has become increasingly complex in the space of just a few years.
