Willem Marinus van Rossum

Willem van Rossum was born in Zwolle, Netherlands, to Jan and Hendrika (née Veldwillems) van Rossum. He entered the Minor Seminary of Culemborg in 1867 and joined the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, more commonly known as the Redemptorists, on 15 June 1873. He made his profession as a Redemptorist on 16 June 1874.

He was ordained a priest in Wittem on 17 October 1879. He then taught Latin and rhetoric in Roermond and was a professor of dogmatic theology at the Scholasticate of Wittem from 1883 to 1892. He became the prefect of studies there in 1886 and its rector in 1893.

After becoming a member of the Redemptorist community in Rome in 1895, Rossum was named a consultor to the Congregation of the Holy Office on 25 December 1896. He also became a counselor to the Commission for the Codification of Canon Law on 15 April 1904. He served as general consultor of the Redemptorists from 1909 to 1911.

In 1911, Pope Pius X made him Cardinal-Deacon of San Cesareo in Palatio, the first Dutch cardinal since the Protestant Reformation. In 1914, he became president of the Pontifical Biblical Commission. In 1915, he was named head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, one of the three tribunals of the Roman Curia and was also raised to the rank of Cardinal Priest, with the titular church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme. He was appointed titular bishop of Caesarea in Mauretania and Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of the Peoples.

He participated in the papal conclaves that elected Pope Benedict XV and Pope Pius XI.

Van Rossum died on 30 August 1932 in a Maastricht hospital, after falling ill on returning from a visit to Denmark. He was buried in the Witten cemetery, but later in the Redemptorist church in Wittem.

• Catholic Hierarchy: Willem Marinus Cardinal van Rossum, C.SS.R.