Nuncio to Spain appointed amid tension between government, bishops

After months of speculation, the Holy See announced Monday the appointment of Archbishop Piero Pioppo as apostolic nuncio to Spain.

The Pillar had reported last month that Pioppo was the Vatican’s pick for the position, but that the government was delaying the process in protest over recent tensions with the Spanish bishops’ conference.

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Those tensions, present for months, had escalated in June, when Archbishop Luis Argüello, president of the Spanish bishops’ conference, publicly urged Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez to call early elections over recent corruption scandals involving government officials — a suggestion many bishops endorsed.

Argüello’s call was widely seen as a vote of no confidence in the Spanish government. Justice Minister Félix Bolaños accused the Church of siding with the far right, prompting Argüello to reiterate his call for an early election.

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Pioppo, ordained a priest in 1985, had been widely regarded as the Vatican Secretariat of State’s preferred candidate for the Spanish nunciature, which has been vacant since February.

Archbishop Pioppo has a lengthy resume for the job: He served as Cardinal Angelo Sodano’s Vatican secretary in the early 2000s, held a role at the Vatican Bank, and has been apostolic nuncio to Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, and Indonesia.

Various Spanish outlets had reported July 24 that Pioppo was to become the nuncio to Spain. But Vatican blog Silere Non Possum reported on July 29 that the appointment had been derailed after weeks of waiting for the Spanish government’s approval, and that the Vatican had decided to take a different direction with the appointment.

Spanish government officials denied that account in late July, according to a Spanish foreign affairs outlet.

Sources close to the Spanish nunciature told The Pillar that the appointment had not been vetoed by the Spanish government — but that Spanish civic officials were believed to be slow-walking the approval to show the government’s displeasure with the local hierarchy.

Tensions have been high between the Spanish government and the hierarchy for months.

The biggest source of controversy has been connected to the Valley of the Fallen, a monument built by dictator Francisco Franco in 1959 dedicated to those killed in the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s.

The monument is rich in Catholic imagery, including a 500-foot vertical cross, a cross-shaped basilica, and a Benedictine monastery.

In May, the Spanish government and the local hierarchy reached a compromise to “resignify” the secular elements of the monument. It is not clear what this “resignification” will consist of, but it has created apprehension in the local Church, as many Catholics believe the move is just a preamble to also modifying the religious sections of the monument. There is also a general distrust of the negotiations that led to the compromise, which were kept secret. It is widely believed that the bishops were forced into the agreement.

Custody of the monument belongs, among others, to the Spanish state and private foundations. Before the compromise, then-apostolic nuncio Archbishop Bernardito Auza had been involved in discussions about the future of the Benedictine monastery located at the monument, and was a strong opponent of the “resignification” of the monument, according to sources close to the Spanish nunciature.

Auza was considered a theological conservative and defended the presence of the Benedictines at the monument. He also defended the former prior of the monastery, Fr. Santiago Cantera, when the government pushed for his removal, something that eventually occurred in March 2025.

Other factors in the strained relationship between the bishops and the Spanish government include disputes over religious education, a government-commissioned clerical abuse report, and conflicts over gender and abortion policy.

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