Lay cardinal

In the historical practice of the Catholic Church, a lay cardinal was a man whom the pope appointed to the College of Cardinals while still a layman. This appointment carried with it the obligation to be ordained to a clerical order,^[1] meaning that "lay cardinal" was not a permanent state, but a term in reference to a man who was appointed cardinal prior to taking on the clerical state corresponding to that appointment.^[2]

Teodolfo Mertel, the last man to have been created cardinal without first having been ordained a deacon. He was ordained to the diaconate in 1858, a few months after becoming a cardinal.

The current law of the Catholic Church is that a man must be first ordained at least a priest in order to be considered for appointment as a cardinal.^[3]

List of laymen who were created cardinals

Name	Year created cardinal	Highest clerical order received
Pope Paul III	1493	Pope
Pope Leo X	1489	Pope
Charles Borromeo	1560	Archbishop
Ferdinando I de' Medici	1562	Minor orders[4]
Maurice of Savoy	1607	Minor orders[4]
Francisco Gómez Rojas de Sandoval	1618[5]	Priest[6]
Ferdinand of Austria	1620	Minor orders[7]
Giulio Raimondo Mazzarino	1641	Minor orders
Marino Carafa di Belvedere [it]	1801	Resigned before being ordained[8][9]
Teodolfo Mertel	1858	Deacon[10]

Discontinuation

In 1917, Pope Benedict XV promulgated the first edition of the Code of Canon Law, which included a provision that a man must be first ordained a priest prior to being considered for appointment as a cardinal.^[11]

According to The New York Times, Pope Paul VI considered making the French Catholic philosopher Jacques Maritain a cardinal in 1965.^[12]

See also

• Crown cardinal
• Cardinal-Infante (disambiguation)
• Cardinal-nephew
• List of creations of cardinals