Jean-Pierre Ricard

Jean-Pierre Ricard (born 26 September 1944) is a French prelate of the Catholic Church who was Archbishop of Bordeaux from 2001 to 2019.

Born in Marseille on 26 September 1944 to Georges and Jeanine Ricard, Jean-Pierre Ricard attended the Lycée de Saint-Charles and the Lycée Périer where he earned his Baccalauréat and then at Lycée Thiers (hypokhâgne).

He studied philosophy at the Major Seminary of Marseille from 1962 to 1964.

He spent one year performing National Service to promote development in Bamako, Mali.

He also studied at the Carmes Seminary in Paris, and the Institut Catholique de Paris, earning a degree in theology and preparing for a doctorate.

He was ordained a priest on 5 October 1968 in Marseille and did pastoral work in the Archdiocese of Marseille from 1968 to 1993.

He was assistant pastor of the parish of Sainte-Émilie de Vialoar from 1970 to 1978 with responsibility for religious teaching, the formation of priests and laymen.

He headed the Mistral Center of Religious Culture from 1975 to 1981 and was diocesan delegate for seminarians from 1975 to 1985.

While pastor of the parish of Sainte-Marguerite from 1981 to 1988, he served as associate delegate for ecumenism and episcopal vicar for the zone of south Marseille from 1984 to 1988.

He was regional theologian for pastoral affairs (1986–1993) and general secretary of the Diocesan Synod of Marseille (1988–1991), and vicar general from 1988 to 1993 to Cardinal Robert Coffy, Archbishop of Marseille.

Ricard was named titular bishop of Pulcheriopoli and appointed auxiliary bishop of Grenoble on 17 April 1993.

He received his episcopal consecration on 6 June 1993 at the cathedral of Sainte-Marie-Majeure, Marseille, from Cardinal Coffy.

On 4 July 1996 he was appointed Coadjutor Bishop of Montpellier and became bishop there upon the death of his predecessor on 6 September.

He became vice-president of the Bishops' Conference of France on 9 November 1999 and participated in the Tenth Ordinary Synod of Bishops, held in Vatican City, 30 September–27 October 2001.

From 2001 to 2007 he was president of the French Episcopal Conference.

In November 2022, Ricard admitted he sexually abused a 14-year-old girl in the 1980s when he was a parish priest.

Both French prosecutors and the Holy See launched investigations, though criminal proceedings were dropped in February 2023 because the statute of limitations had expired.

Church authorities then imposed restrictions on Ricard's exercise of his ministry for five years.

He was elected to a three-year term as president of the Conference on 6 November 2001 and re-elected to another term in 2004.

Pope John Paul II named him Archbishop of Bordeaux on 21 December 2001.

On 6 September 2002, John Paul named him a member of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Pope Benedict renewed that appointment on 6 May 2006.

He gave a series of interviews that appeared as a book, Les Sept Défis pour l'Eglise (The Seven Challenges for the Church) in 2003.

He attended the 11th General Ordinary Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, Vatican City, 2–23 October 2005.

He has been a cardinal since 2006.

He was previously Bishop of Montpellier for five years and before that an auxiliary bishop in Grenoble.

He was made Cardinal-Priest of Sant'Agostino in the consistory of 24 March 2006 by Pope Benedict XVI.

He was appointed to the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, the commission responsible for relations with the Society of Saint Pius X on 8 April 2006.

In 2006, as president of the French Bishops Conference, Ricard objected to the recent authorization of the use of human embryos for scientific research in France and elsewhere in Europe.

He called it a grave ethical transgression.

On 17 January 2009, Pope Benedict XVI appointed him a member of the Pontifical Council for Culture.

In 2009 Ricard told the newspaper La Croix that the Pope Benedict wanted to reconcile all Catholics by allowing a wider use of the Traditional Latin Mass, which does not undermine the achievements of Vatican Council II.

On 21 January 2010 he was appointed a member of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, and on 6 July 2010 of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, and on 12 June 2012 of the Congregation for Catholic Education, and confirmed in the Education post by Pope Francis on 30 November 2013.

He was one of the cardinal electors who participated in the 2013 papal conclave that elected Pope Francis.

On 8 March 2014, he was named by Pope Francis to serve as a member of the newly established Council for Economic Affairs, intended to oversee the work of the new Secretariat for the Economy, the financial regulatory agency for the departments of the Roman Curia.

He closed the Archdiocese's Saint Joseph seminary in May 2019 because enrollment failed to meet the minimum number of seminarians required.

He said its seminarians can continue their studies and spiritual formation in Toulouse or Rome and that the closure was part of a national assessment of the country's many small seminaries.

On 11 July 2019, Bordeaux Mayor Nicolas Florian awarded Ricard the city's medal.

On that occasion, Ricard praised the city for fostering collaboration between civic authorities and the leaders of its religious communities.

He said he anticipated retiring as Archbishop of Bordeaux in a few weeks and returning to his native region.

He announced on 4 August that he had already submitted his letter of resignation to Pope Francis, who accepted it on 1 October without naming his successor.