H.E. Msgr. Carrasco de Paula is the current president of the Pontifical Academy for Life. He was ordained as a priest for the Personal Prelature of Opus Dei on August 8, 1966. He was director of the Bioethics Institute of the University of the Sacred Heart in Rome and is a member of the ethics committee for experimentation clinic at the Gemelli Policlinic of Rome. He began to work at the academy in 1994 when it was established by John Paul II. Cardinal Fiorenzo Angelini called him and asked him to assist as a consultor of the department.
He served as chancellor of the Pontifical Academy for Life from January 3, 2005, until his appointment by Pope Benedict XVI as president of the academy on June 30, 2010.