The President of the Governorate of the Vatican City State Visits Mount Angel Seminary
On February 6, 2026, Sister Raffaella Petrini, FSE, President of the Governorate of the Vatican City State, gave a lecture for Mount Angel Seminary’s Pastoral Symposium and dialogued with members of the Seminary community. Participants in the symposium included Fr. Jeff Eirvin, the Seminary’s president-rector, Bishop Peter Smith, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon, Seminary faculty and staff, monks and seminarians. Sister Petrini’s keynote talk, Complementary Gifts: Collaborative Leadership in the Church, was part of the Seminary’s Archbishop Robert J. Dwyer Lecture Series, an ongoing formation series named for the 5th Archbishop of Portland in Oregon.
Sister Petrini is a member of the Franciscan Sisters of the Eucharist and was appointed by Pope Francis as President of the Pontifical Commission for the Vatican City State and President of the Governorate of the Vatican City State on March 1, 2025. According to Vatican News, that appointment made her “the first woman to hold the highest leadership position within the Vatican’s administrative structure.” Prior to her current role, she served as Secretary General of the Governorate of the Vatican City State since 2021. Sister Petrini has also been a member of the Vatican Dicastery for Bishops and on the Board of Directors for APSA (Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See) since 2022.
In the first part of her talk, Sister Petrini spoke in detail about the administrative organization of the Vatican City State and her responsibilities as President. Even though Vatican City is the smallest country in the world both in terms of square kilometers (0.44 km2) and population (695 citizens, 892 residents), the administrative responsibilities are complex and diverse. As a country situated within the Republic of Italy, “the enclave has a daily need to interact with the external world,” said Sister Petrini. Much of her work also involves the many employees and their families who contribute to the daily life of the Vatican City State. This includes institutional communications that help employees connect their daily tasks to a higher purpose to a nursery school for employees’ children. “The fraternal agape is an essential part of our activities,” said Sister Petrini.
She also described the unique experience of serving as President of the Governorate from the death of Pope Francis to the election of Pope Leo XIV, a time of profound grieving and new graces. “The city was literally still. Everything stopped. It was like an empty world for just a few days,” said Sister Petrini, describing the moment of Pope Francis’s passing. The immense amount of work and care involved during the official period of mourning and preparing for the conclave made it “a very prayerful time, a very sacred time,” she said.
In the second part of her talk, Sister Petrini outlined five principles for collaborative leadership from her administrative experience: presence, formation, diverse gifts, complexity and service. She spoke about the importance of delegating tasks responsibly, where the leader must know enough about many different roles to responsibly entrust those roles to others. “As priests and religious, we do need to care about competence, skills, when we go out there,” she said. “We are called to work with resources that are not ours.” Sister Petrini highlighted that a servant leader brings out the best in others to serve the common good. “The greater talent of a modern leader in any ecclesial or non-ecclesial context is the capacity to have people work together, to bring the skills together,” she said.
At the conclusion of the symposium, Fr. Eirvin gave an icon on behalf of Abbot Jeremy to Sister Petrini in appreciation for her visit. Written by Br. Claude Lane, OSB, the icon, “Our Lady of Mount Vernon,” is based on a painting of the Virgin Mary reading a book that originally hung in the home of George Washington. Sister Petrini expressed her gratitude and joy to be at Mount Angel Seminary and engage with the community.
Read more about Sister Petrini’s visit to Mount Angel Seminary on the Vatican City State’s website.
—Ethan Alano
