Roman Catholic Cardinal. One of eight brothers, Antonio José González Zumárraga was born in Pujilí and received his education at the Minor Seminary of San Luis in Quito, the Major Seminary of San José in the same city, and later at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical University of Salamanca in Spain, from where he earned a doctorate in canon law. Ordained priest in Quito on June 29, 1951, he was successively appointed coadjutor of the pastor of San Sebastián, and in 1953, of the pastor of El Belén. Named vice-rector of the Borja boarding school in 1957, the following year he was appointed vice-secretary of the archdiocesan curia. Consecutively he served as faculty member of the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador and of the School of Religious Science. Canon of the chapter of the metropolitan cathedral, González Zumárraga served furthermore as faculty member of the Sagrados Corazones school of Rumipamba, chancellor of the archdiocesan curia and rector of the Nuestra Madre de la Merced school between 1961 and 1969. Elected auxiliary bishop for the archdiocese of Quito on May 17, 1969, he received his episcopal consecration with the titular see of Tagarata on the following June 15 inside the cathedral of Quito from Cardinal Pablo Muñoz Vega SJ. Promoted to coadjutor archbishop with right of succession of the archdiocese of Quito on June 28, 1980, he succeeded on June 1, 1985 upon the retirement of the named Cardinal Muñoz Vega. President of the Ecuadorian Episcopal Conference between 1987 and 1990 and again from 1990 till 1993, he was named by the Holy See as primate of Ecuador on November 11, 1995. Pope John Paul II elevated him to the Sacred College of Cardinals in the consistory of February 21, 2001 with the title of Santa Maria in Via. Retiring from the pastoral government of his see on March 21, 2003, the Cardinal died on Monday, October 13, 2008, early in the morning in Quito of stomach cancer, from which he suffered for some time. His body was exposed in the metropolitan cathedral of Quito where the funeral mass took place on Tuesday, October 14, in the morning. The late Cardinal was successively buried in the crypt of the same cathedral.