Roman Catholic Cardinal. The eldest of ten children born to a cobbler and his wife who worked as a school teacher, Lucas Moreira Neves's ancestors from his father's side descended from African slaves who came from Benin. His cousin, Tancredo de Almeida Neves, served as prime minister of Brazil who eventually elected president, never took office due to ill health. Entering the minor seminary of Mariana, he joined the Order of Preachers, taking his solemn vows on March 7, 1945. Studying theology at the Saint-Maximin theological school of Var, Fréjus-Toulon, France, he was ordained priest there on on July 9, 1950. Back in Brazil, he served as vice-master of novices and students, sub-prior of the Dominican priory of Rio de Janeiro, ecclesiastical assistant of the youths of the Catholic universities of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, director of the journal "Mensageiro do Santo Rosario", spiritual counselor to the Christian Family Movement and later its national vice-assistant, official within the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Brazil and spiritual counselor to various intellectuals and artists, especially theater, in both Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. Elected bishop of the titular see of Feradi Maggiore and appointed auxiliary for the see of São Paulo on June 9, 1967, he received his episcopal consecration on the following August 26 from Cardinal Agnelo Rossi. President of the Brazilian Cáritas between 1971 and 1974 and vice-president of the Council for the Laity, he was named secretary of the Sacred Congregation for Bishops and promoted to the rank of archbishop on October 15, 1979. Appointed secretary of the Sacred College of Cardinals on November 15, 1979, he was transferred to the titular see of Vescovio, on January 3, 1987. Promoted to the metropolitan see of São Salvador da Bahia on July 9, 1987, Dom Lucas was a member of the Brazilian Academy of Letters, being an erudite presence in the cultural scene of his country known as a prolific author of newspaper columns, theater criticism and books. Pope John Paul II created him cardinal priest in the consistory of June 28, 1988 with the title of Ss. Bonifacio ed Alessio. President of the Episcopal Conference of Brazil between 1995 and 1998, he was named prefect of the Congregation for Bishops and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America both 'ad normam iuris', becoming thus the first Latin American to occupy the presidency of the commission. Named bishop of the suburbicarian see of Sabina-Poggio Mirteto retaining 'in commendam 'the title of Ss. Bonifacio ed Alessio, he resigned the pastoral government of the archdiocese on June 25, 1998 and later the prefecture and the presidency on September 16, 2000. Moreira Neves was widely considered a potential candidate for Papacy, although many fellow Brazilians looked at him as an ambitious, unprincipled careerist, dubbing him "the Pope's man in Brazil". Despite of being accused of destroying progressive social and political programmes funded and operated by the Catholic Church in the country, in his archdiocese he did his best to support attempts to help the landless, the dispossessed and marginalized, although he did visibly enjoy the splendor of the historic home of the archbishops of Salvador de Bahia and drove around in a limousine with personalized number plates indicating his exalted rank. Slight and wiry, playing down the health problems that resulted from the diagnosis of diabetes in his fifties, he never quite managed to shake off the impression of striking a pose, smooth-tongued church bureaucrat without firm principles but high on ambition. Often misjudged because of such looks, even when telling reporters, without revealing his cancer, that he would be in heaven before the next conclave chose a Pope, he was judged to be electioneering. Stricken with cancer, the Cardinal died at the age of 77 of diabetic related complications, on Sunday, September 8, 2002 at 5 pm., assisted by one of his sisters at the Pius XI Clinic in Rome where he spent his last week undergoing daily dialysis due to acute kidney deficiency. The funeral mass took place at the Patriarchal Vatican Basilica, on Wednesday, September 11. Transported back to his native Brazil, his remains are found buried inside the metropolitan cathedral basilica of São Salvador da Bahia as he had requested shortly before his death. The Memorial Dom Lucas Moreira Neves established in São João del Rei in 2003 houses a museum dedicated to his memory.