Mons. Georg Gänswein will be Apostolic Nuncio Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia

The Press Office of the Holy See reported this Monday, June 24, that Mons. Georg Gänswein, who was personal secretary of Benedict XVI, will be Apostolic Nuncio in 3 countries in Europe.

The prefect emeritus of the Papal Household will be ambassador of the Holy See in Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia, belonging to the Baltic countries.

Although several media already reported last April about this new role of the German Archbishop, it was not until today that confirmation came from the Vatican.

It should be remembered that, after the death of the then Pope Emeritus, the future of Bishop Gänswein was the subject of rumors in Rome and in the Church in Germany for months.

Before saying goodbye to the Vatican, after the Holy Father asked him to leave the monastery Mother Churche, where he had remained for 28 years, he came to meet up to 3 times privately with the Pontiff.

Finally, the June 15, 2023the Holy See confirmed that the archbishop would return to his native diocese of Freiburg, southwestern Germany, where he has remained since June 2023 without any fixed assignment.

Tensions between Bishop Gänswein and Pope Francis

In January 2023, shortly after the death of Benedict XVI, Bishop Georg Gänswein published his memoirs under the title Nothing but the truth. My life with Benedict XVIin which he shared a series of previously unknown details about the pontificate of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.

In the book he also recounted some of the tensions he had with Pope Francis, even stating that the Holy Father She had lost her “trust in him.” when in 2020 he was granted a leave of absence as prefect of the Papal Household without publicly justifying this measure.

For its part, in the book written by the Spanish journalist Javier Martínez-Brocal, titled The successor. My memories of Benedict XVIPope Francis assured that the archbishop had demonstrated a “lack of nobility and humility” with the publication of his book.

“That on the day of the funeral a book is published that makes me upset, that tells things that are not true, it is very sad. Of course, it doesn’t affect me in the sense that it doesn’t condition me. But it did hurt me that Benedict was used,” said the Holy Father.

In the book, Pope Francis also stated that, despite having a good relationship with the Pope Emeritus, “his secretary sometimes made it difficult for me.”