10/11/2025
Pope Leo XIV has appointed Nigerian priest Edward Daniang Daleng, OSA, as vice regent of the Prefecture of the Papal Household — the Vatican office responsible for organizing papal audiences and ceremonies.
The prefecture also oversees preparations for papal liturgies, the Holy Father’s spiritual retreats, meetings of the College of Cardinals and the Roman Curia, and arrangements for the pope’s visits within Rome and Italy.
Father Daniang, a longtime friend and confrere of Pope Leo, has served as general councilor and most recently as procurator general of the Order of St. Augustine, the pontiff’s own religious order. In that role, he managed the order’s relations and official business with the Holy See.
Born April 4, 1977, in Yitla’ar, Kwalla, Plateau State, Nigeria, Daniang entered the Augustinian order in 2001, professing solemn vows in 2004 and being ordained a priest the following year. He later earned a doctorate in moral theology from Rome’s Pontifical Alphonsian Academy in 2012, writing his thesis on the dignity and care of patients with incurable and terminal illnesses.
Daniang first met Pope Leo in 2001 when then–Father Robert Prevost, the future pontiff, visited Nigeria as prior general of the Augustinians. Their friendship deepened after Daniang moved to Rome in 2002.
He told EWTN News in August that he and Prevost have had many occasions to meet and speak over the ensuing decades.
“Something that struck me was his simplicity, his humility,” Daniang said. “That is how he was, how he is.”
Speaking to Vatican News after the election of Pope Leo XIV, Daniang also said that “Africa is in [Leo’s] heart” and that when he was prior general of the Augustinians, then-Father Prevost visited Nigeria at least 10 times.
“To understand how much my country mattered to him,” the priest continued, “just remember that after becoming prior general on his 46th birthday, Sept. 14, he was already with us in Nigeria by November.”
✍️: Almudena Martínez-Bordiú | ACI
