Bondi Beach attack: Pope Leo prays for victims
Pope Leo condemned an attack on Jews celebrating Hanukkah that left at least 16 people dead on Australia’s Bondi Beach.
VATICAN CITY, Dec 18 (Reuters) – Pope Leo has replaced Cardinal Timothy Dolan as leader of the Catholic Church in New York, the Vatican announced on Thursday, sidelining a prominent figure in the American church in a major overhaul of the country’s Catholic leadership.
Leo, the first American pope, appointed Bishop Ronald Hicks, a relatively unknown cleric from Illinois, to replace Dolan as leader of the nation’s second-largest Catholic diocese, with about 2.8 million members.
Dolan, who has served as archbishop of New York since 2009 and is a former president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, has offered to resign when he turns 75 in February, in accordance with canon law. Cardinals often work until the age of 80, which is the mandatory retirement age.
David Gibson, an expert on the American church, said, “Mr. Hicks represents a new chapter not just in New York, but in the American church as a whole.”
The Archdiocese of New York is a vast and influential institution, serving Catholics in 296 dioceses and hundreds of Catholic schools and hospitals across Manhattan, the Bronx, Staten Island, and seven northern counties.
Leo’s appointment to replace Dolan comes as the archdiocese struggles to raise more than $300 million in settlements with victims of abuse by Catholic clergy.
The archdiocese is in mediation with about 1,300 alleged survivors, and Dolan announced on Dec. 8 that the archdiocese would cut its operating budget by 10%, lay off staff and sell real estate to raise money to pay.
Hicks, 58, has been the church leader in Joliet, the county seat of Will County, Illinois, since 2020. He previously served as auxiliary bishop, or vice bishop, under Cardinal Blaise Cupich of Chicago.
His biography has some similarities with Leo’s. Although both are from the South Chicago suburbs, they spent many years in Latin America as missionaries, Leo in Peru and Hicks in El Salvador.
“(Leo) has risen to become the most prominent American from the state of Illinois, much like himself,” said Gibson, director of Fordham University’s Center for Religion and Culture.
(Reporting by Joshua McElwee; Editing by Andrew Cawthorn)
