Roman Catholic Cardinal. Piacenza born Luigi Poggi was the son of a tailor of liturgical vestments who worked under the shade of the steeple of Sant'Antonino's Basilica which today houses the remains of the Cardinal. Frequenting the local Collegio Alberoni, he was ordained priest on July 28, 1940. After briefly serving as vice-pastor of the parish church of San Francesco, he was sent to Rome in order to further his studies, earning a doctorate in utroque iuris in July 1944 from the Pontifical Athenaeum of Sant'Apollinare. Successively, between 1944 and 1946, he underwent studies in diplomacy at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy. Rendering in the meantime pastoral ministry in the Roman parishes of Santi Fabiano e Venanzio and San Salvatore in Lauro, as well at the church of Val Cannuta next to the Pontifical Brazilian College, he joined the Vatican Secretariat of State in the section of relations with the states in 1945. Between 1947 and 1950, he was in charge of the spiritual assistance of the detainees in the jail of Regina Coeli of Rome. Named Privy Chamberlain Supernumerary of His Holiness on June 15, 1949 and Domestic Prelate of His Holiness on April 14, 1960, in the spring of 1963 he was put in charge of the mission to the Republic of Tunisia which led to negotiation of a 'modus vivendi', signed in the spring of 1964. Pope Paul VI named him apostolic delegate to Central Africa (Cameroun, Chad, Congo-Brazzaville, Gabon, and the Centroafrican Republic) with residence in Yaoundé, with Poggi receiving his episcopal consecration with the titular archbishopric see of Forontoniana at the basilica of San Carlo al Corso in Rome from Cardinal Amleto Giovanni Cicognani on May 9, 1965. Successively, he was appointed pro-Nuncio in Cameroun on October 31, 1966, pro-nuncio in Gabon on October 31, 1967, pro-nuncio in the Centroafrican Republic on November 4, 1967, apostolic nuncio in Perú on May 21, 1969 and apostolic nuncio with special charge to improve relations with Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania and Bulgaria on August 1, 1973. Chief of the Vatican delegation for permanent working contact with Poland on February 7, 1975, he was named apostolic nuncio in Italy on April 19, 1986. On September 17, 1988 he consecrated his younger brother Carlo, bishop of the diocese of Fidenza. Pope John Paul II appointed Msgr. Poggi, pro-Archivist and pro-librarian of the Holy Roman Church on April 9, 1992, creating him cardinal deacon with the deaconry of Santa Maria in Domnica in the consistory of November 26, 1994. Naming him archivist and librarian of the Holy Roman Church three days later, he retired from office in November 1998. Named cardinal protodeacon on February 26, 2002, he opted for the order of cardinal priests and the title of San Lorenzo in Lucina on February 24, 2005. Cardinal Luigi Poggi died on Tuesday, May 4, 2010 in the morning, inside his apartment at via Rusticucci 13 in Rome. Funeral mass was celebrated on Friday, May 7, at 5.30 pm., inside the Patriarchal Vatican Basilica, presided by Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Dean of the Sacred College of Cardinals. At the end of the Eucharistic Celebration, Pope Benedict XVI delivered an homily and presided over the rite of the ultima commendatio and valedictio. Following the latter celebration, his remains were transferred to his native Piacenza, where another requiem mass was celebrated the next morning at 11 am., presided by Bishop Gianni Ambrosio inside the basilica of Sant'Antonino, where interment also took place, in accordance with the wishes of the late Cardinal.