Beginning on Monday, September 3, 2018, the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin has a new Minister General: Br. Roberto Genuin, OFM Cap., a member of the Province of the Holy Cross, Italy. In the vote held today during the 185th General Chapter in Rome, Roberto was elected on the first ballot obtaining 101 votes out of 188 of the capitulars, representing the more than 10,000 Friars scattered throughout the world. Having accepted the Chapter’s decision, he became our new International Minister, traditionally considered the "successor to St. Francis of Assisi," and the brother who is called to serve the needs of the Order, the brothers who live the life of the Friars Minor Capuchin.
Roberto was born on September 20, 1961, in Falcade (Belluno), Italy. At eleven, he entered the Capuchin Seminary of Castelmonte (Udine) of the Venetian Province, made his temporary profession of vows on October 4, 1981, and was ordained to the priesthood on June 27, 1987.
He went on to receive his doctorate from Rome’s Lateran University in Canon Law in 1996. As a delegate, Roberto has participated in the General Chapters of 2006, 2012 and 2018. He was elected Minister Provincial of the Venetian Province in 2008 and served two terms until 2014. At that time, the new Province merger of Trent and Veneto took place (Province of the Holy Cross), and the General Council nominated him to be Minister of the new Province. He served from 2014-2017.
The service of Roberto Genuin was characterized by a unique harmony between the expectations of the Order and those of the Church, in its multiple incarnations. In nine years, as Minister Provincial, he visited all the friars of his Province in Italy and abroad, where confreres work as missionaries or in quiet service of the Church (Angola, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Brazil, Greece, Hungary, Georgia, Israel, Switzerland). In Italy, in addition to the Venetian friars attached to the houses of the General Curia, he responded positively to other requests in favor of supplying friars for our international houses in Loreto (Ancona) and the Formation House in Frascati (Rome).
In August 2016, after careful evaluation, the Custody "St. Mary of the Angels" in Angola (a provincial mission) was elevated to the level of a Province.
At the request of the Order, he then sent young friars not only to the Provincial Delegations in Greece and Hungary, but also to the Order’s new ministries in Georgia (Asia), Switzerland and Clermont-Ferrand (France), joining wholeheartedly with the "Project for Europe" encouraged by the Order's leadership.
In close relationship with the central government of the Order, he has done his best to assure that our Capuchin House of Jerusalem, "Christ the light of the world," would have the necessary personnel and resources to continue. Likewise, he collaborated as a member of the Commission for the revision of the Constitutions. He was a member of the Preparatory Commission for the current General Chapter of 2018, and he has also shown a particular sensitivity in the animation and strengthening of the Secular Franciscan Order (SFO) and its Franciscan Youth organization [GIFRA in Italian or YOUFRA in English].
Mauro Jöhri, OFM Cap., the outgoing General Minister,
led the friars from the chapel at our Collegio San Lorenzo
to the Chapter Hall where the vote was taken,
and the friars celebrated at a festive pranzo after the elaction.
