Prospero Lorenzo Lambertini, born into a noble family of Bologna, at this time the second largest city in the Papal States, had been created Cardinal-Priest of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme on May 10, 1728 and had been elected Pope in 1740 to succeed Clement XII.

The conclave that elected him had lasted for six months, and he is reported to have said to the cardinals: "If you wish to elect a saint, choose Gotti; a statesman, Aldrovandi; an honest man, me".

His pontificate had begun in a time of great difficulties, chiefly caused by the disputes between Catholic rulers and the Papacy about governmental demands to nominate bishops rather than leaving the appointment to the Church.

He has managed to overcome most of these problems—the Holy See's disputes with the Kingdom of Naples, Sardinia, Spain, Venice, and Austria are settled.

He will have a very active papacy, reforming the education of priests, the calendar of feasts of the Church, and many papal institutions.

Perhaps the most important act of Benedict XIV's pontificate is the promulgation of his famous laws about missions in the two bulls, Ex quo singulari and Omnium solicitudinum.

In these bulls, he rules on the custom of accommodating Christian words and usages to express non-Christian ideas and practices of the native cultures, which had been extensively done by the Jesuits in their Indian and Chinese missions.

An example of this is the statues of ancestors—there had long been uncertainty whether honor paid to one's ancestors was unacceptable 'ancestor worship,' or if it was something more like the Catholic veneration of the saints.

This question is especially pressing in the case of an ancestor known not to have been a Christian.

The choice of a Chinese translation for the name of God had also been debated since the early seventeenth century.

Benedict XIV denounces these practices in these two bulls.

The consequence of this is that many of these converts leave the Church.

Benedict XIV on December 22, 1741, promulgates the papal bull "Immensa Pastorum principis" against the enslavement of the indigenous peoples of the Americas and other countries.