You are right. For one, Cardinal Cupich is on the Dicastry for Bishops which determines the order of preference for the 3 candidates to submit to the Pope.
Second, the Pope can bypass that Dicastry altogether and listen to anyone he wants to in choosing a bishop. Cardinal Rai, the retired Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, stated Mc…
You are right. For one, Cardinal Cupich is on the Dicastry for Bishops which determines the order of preference for the 3 candidates to submit to the Pope.
Second, the Pope can bypass that Dicastry altogether and listen to anyone he wants to in choosing a bishop. Cardinal Rai, the retired Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, stated McCarrick was not one of the 3 candidates recommended for Arrchbishop of Washington.
Cupich was himself a personal choice of Pope Francis as he could never get a majority of American bishops to vote for him for any position in the USCCB, so I highly doubt the then nuncio in the US Archbishop Vigano put Cupich on the list of 3 candidates for Chicago, and Pope Francis himself was chosen Auxiliary Bishop and later Archbishop of Buenas Aires upon the recommendation of the previous Archbishop Cardinal Quarrancino since nearly everyone else in Argentina could not stand Father Bergoglio for his dictatorial tendencies and he had been relegated to being a professor at an obscure seminary in Argentina.
Cupich is so quickly getting his men in in case Pope Francis dies that Archbishop Weisenburger in Detroit was installed before the Pope could even approve his appointment by signing the appropriate document as reported by the Pillar.
I think this is rather a strained interpretation of the Weisenburger situation. As I understood the article, the appointment had been made and announced by Pope Francis but he became seriously ill before he could undertake the formality of signing the appropriate papal bull.
That is what the Nuncio Cardinal Pierre said, but given how long some of these archdioceses in the US have had an archbishop waiting for a replacement and suddenly within 3 months Milwaukee, Washington DC, Detroit, Cincinnati, and Omaha are filled with Cupich proteges and friends makes me believe someone was in an awful hurry to get certain bishops through right around the time Pope Francis' health started deteriorating. I know Archbishop Vigneron in Detroit (I know people in that Archdiocese who would know) is in good health, so there was no reason to push Weisenburger through in a hurry except the fact that Pope Francis was almost at death's door and Cardinal Cupich nor his friend the Nuncio Cardinal Pierre may have as much influence with the next Pope as they have with this one. By the way: I wish Pope Francis many more years and for him to never make the horrible blunder of resigning.
All of these major appointments were compiled in the US months ago. They probably didn't even go through the plenary session of the Dicastery for Bishops but went right to the pope for a decision.
You may be right, but if you follow the appointment of new bishops on a website like catholic-hierarchy.org, there was a tremendous amount of activity naming bishops around the world when Pope Francis was in the hospital, which means the final steps were taken recently and in a hurry.
I don't want to imply that the process was perfect and unpolitical prior to Pope Francis and Cardinal Cupich. It certainly was! And the pope always has the right to appoint the bishops he wants. I would hate to have that policy changed.
What we are seeing now are disturbing trends: the appointment of ideologues to major appointments because of their ideology, the appointment of mediocre priests, some of whom are morally questionable, to other dioceses, and in spite of all this talk on synodal listening, to ignore the voices of those who best know the local situation.
I don't really despair, though. The ideologues are either older or mediocre, so they will struggle to overcome the younger faithful. They will also find few men under the age of 70 to carry out their visions.
I agree. The quality of the young priests in the US is so high that the liberal bishops have slim pickings to choose from in choosing like minded liberals in the future as their successors.
I hope they all pretend they are aligned with Pope Francis. Sort of like Bishop Paprocki who was a protege of the ultraliberal Cardinal Bernardin, but became an awesome orthodox bishop. I am actually hoping 56 year old Bishop Andrew Cozzens of Crookston, Minnesota, who was in charge of the National Eucharistic Congress, is advanced, but he may have to wait for the next Pope.
I am surprised that you put the Polish-born Bishop Fedek into the mix. Polish priests and bishops are good at pretending to follow the lead of Pope Francis in word, but doing what is right in deed. The poor American bishops get the most criticism from Pope Francis, yet the Polish bishops are way more conservative. They cleverly quote Pope Francis in nearly every document and homily and never openly criticize him or his policies, but completely ignore almost every directive that comes from the Vatican. I personally know at least two Polish-born priests who have high positions in dioceses where Cupich dictates things who are more conservative than Bishop Strickland, but publicly they sound like they are towing the Cupich and Pope Francis line. I pray they do become bishops and make Cardinal Cupich cringe at who got through under his nose.
You are right. For one, Cardinal Cupich is on the Dicastry for Bishops which determines the order of preference for the 3 candidates to submit to the Pope.
Second, the Pope can bypass that Dicastry altogether and listen to anyone he wants to in choosing a bishop. Cardinal Rai, the retired Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, stated McCarrick was not one of the 3 candidates recommended for Arrchbishop of Washington.
Cupich was himself a personal choice of Pope Francis as he could never get a majority of American bishops to vote for him for any position in the USCCB, so I highly doubt the then nuncio in the US Archbishop Vigano put Cupich on the list of 3 candidates for Chicago, and Pope Francis himself was chosen Auxiliary Bishop and later Archbishop of Buenas Aires upon the recommendation of the previous Archbishop Cardinal Quarrancino since nearly everyone else in Argentina could not stand Father Bergoglio for his dictatorial tendencies and he had been relegated to being a professor at an obscure seminary in Argentina.
Cupich is so quickly getting his men in in case Pope Francis dies that Archbishop Weisenburger in Detroit was installed before the Pope could even approve his appointment by signing the appropriate document as reported by the Pillar.
I think this is rather a strained interpretation of the Weisenburger situation. As I understood the article, the appointment had been made and announced by Pope Francis but he became seriously ill before he could undertake the formality of signing the appropriate papal bull.
That is what the Nuncio Cardinal Pierre said, but given how long some of these archdioceses in the US have had an archbishop waiting for a replacement and suddenly within 3 months Milwaukee, Washington DC, Detroit, Cincinnati, and Omaha are filled with Cupich proteges and friends makes me believe someone was in an awful hurry to get certain bishops through right around the time Pope Francis' health started deteriorating. I know Archbishop Vigneron in Detroit (I know people in that Archdiocese who would know) is in good health, so there was no reason to push Weisenburger through in a hurry except the fact that Pope Francis was almost at death's door and Cardinal Cupich nor his friend the Nuncio Cardinal Pierre may have as much influence with the next Pope as they have with this one. By the way: I wish Pope Francis many more years and for him to never make the horrible blunder of resigning.
All of these major appointments were compiled in the US months ago. They probably didn't even go through the plenary session of the Dicastery for Bishops but went right to the pope for a decision.
You may be right, but if you follow the appointment of new bishops on a website like catholic-hierarchy.org, there was a tremendous amount of activity naming bishops around the world when Pope Francis was in the hospital, which means the final steps were taken recently and in a hurry.
I don't want to imply that the process was perfect and unpolitical prior to Pope Francis and Cardinal Cupich. It certainly was! And the pope always has the right to appoint the bishops he wants. I would hate to have that policy changed.
What we are seeing now are disturbing trends: the appointment of ideologues to major appointments because of their ideology, the appointment of mediocre priests, some of whom are morally questionable, to other dioceses, and in spite of all this talk on synodal listening, to ignore the voices of those who best know the local situation.
I don't really despair, though. The ideologues are either older or mediocre, so they will struggle to overcome the younger faithful. They will also find few men under the age of 70 to carry out their visions.
I agree. The quality of the young priests in the US is so high that the liberal bishops have slim pickings to choose from in choosing like minded liberals in the future as their successors.
Just a few of the younger guys we hope to be seeing more of, who are pastorally oriented like our Holy Father:
Bishop José Arturo Cepeda Escobedo (55),
Bishop Ramon Bejarano (55)
Bishop Mario Alberto Avilés Campos, C.O. (55)
Bishop Felipe Pulido (55)
Bishop Evelio Menjivar-Ayala (54)
Bishop Anthony Cerdan Celino (52)
Bishop Juan Rafael Esposito-Garcia (51)
Bishop Artur Bubnevych (49)
Bishop Cristiano Guilherme Borro Barbosa (48)
Bishop Joseph Armando Espaillat (48)
Bishop José Maria Garcia Maldonado (46)
Bishop Robert Fedek (45)
Well . . . we'll see.
All Hispanic but the last?
I hope they all pretend they are aligned with Pope Francis. Sort of like Bishop Paprocki who was a protege of the ultraliberal Cardinal Bernardin, but became an awesome orthodox bishop. I am actually hoping 56 year old Bishop Andrew Cozzens of Crookston, Minnesota, who was in charge of the National Eucharistic Congress, is advanced, but he may have to wait for the next Pope.
I am surprised that you put the Polish-born Bishop Fedek into the mix. Polish priests and bishops are good at pretending to follow the lead of Pope Francis in word, but doing what is right in deed. The poor American bishops get the most criticism from Pope Francis, yet the Polish bishops are way more conservative. They cleverly quote Pope Francis in nearly every document and homily and never openly criticize him or his policies, but completely ignore almost every directive that comes from the Vatican. I personally know at least two Polish-born priests who have high positions in dioceses where Cupich dictates things who are more conservative than Bishop Strickland, but publicly they sound like they are towing the Cupich and Pope Francis line. I pray they do become bishops and make Cardinal Cupich cringe at who got through under his nose.
The Polish bishops have experience in these matters.
Better hope that no one gets hold of the list you put together. That will bring any ‘upward mobility’ to a grinding halt.