On February 23, 2009, Dolan was appointed the tenth Archbishop of New York by Pope Benedict XVI. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, the nation's second-largest after the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles, serves over 2.5 million Roman Catholics. He succeeded Cardinal Edward Egan, who reached the mandatory retirement age of 75 in 2007. According to Dolan, he was informed of his appointment "nine, ten days" prior to the official announcement. Recalling the phone call he received from Apostolic Nuncio Pietro Sambi, as opposed to his appointments as Auxiliary Roman Catholic Bishop of St. Louis and Archbishop of Milwaukee when Dolan was told that the Pope (John Paul II) "would like to" take the posts, he said that Sambi "was quite factual" in that he told him that "the Pope (Benedict XVI) had appointed [him" to New York, giving Dolan little choice other than to accept.