Juan Soldevila y Romero was born in Fuentelapeña, and studied at the seminaries in Valladolid and Toledo before being ordained to the priesthood on 28 December 1867.

Soldevila served as a curate in three parishes in the Archdiocese of Valladolid, and became secretary to the Archbishop, Cesáreo Rodrigo y Rodríguez (1875), a cathedral canon (1883), and an archpriest (1887).

He received his episcopal consecration on the following April 28 from Archbishop Benito Sanz y Forés, with Bishops Mariano Alguacil y Fernández and Cesáreo Rodrigo y Rodríguez.

[2][3] Pope Benedict XV created him Cardinal Priest of Santa Maria del Popolo in the consistory of 15 December 1919.

The apparent motive for the killing was the fact that the Cardinal had been implicated by the anarchists in the hiring and protection of pistoleros who had carried out a campaign of employer-sponsored terrorism against Spanish union members.