New Archbishop Named for Hartford Diocese
By Juliano and Susan Tuz
Deacon Roland Miller, of St. Francis Xavier Church in New Milford, was still processing the news Tuesday afternoon that Bishop Leonard Blair, a Detroit native who has served two stints at the Vatican, was named the new Archbishop of Hartford. New Milford, and Litchfield County, is part of the Hartford diocese. "It's an exciting time," said Miller, 74. "Your imagination goes into high gear thinking `What is he going to ask us to do?' He's the new boss, anointed by Rome. He'll have a workforce of about 600 priests and deacons and he'll point his finger and direct each of us." During a news conference at St. Thomas Seminary in Bloomfield, the incoming archbishop explained how the selection process works. "You are told. You are not asked if you want to do it," Blair said. "That being said, I'm delighted to be appointed." Blair, 64, has been bishop of Toledo for the past 10 years. He said he learned of his new assignment while in Rome on Oct. 17. The next day, he had a brief audience with Pope Francis. "I thanked the Holy Father for the gift and the responsibility he was bestowing upon me, and I asked for his prayers for the diocese in Hartford and Toledo," Blair said. Technical glitches briefly interrupted the session, and as microphones were adjusted to stop the ear-splitting screeches, the archbishop-designee quipped, "Does my first act as archbishop have to be an exorcism?" Blair will be installed as the new spiritual leader of the 700,000 Roman Catholics in the archdiocese on Dec. 16, with a Mass at St. Joseph Cathedral in Hartford. The Most Rev. Henry Mansell, who has headed the archdiocese that serves Catholics in Hartford, New Haven and Litchfield counties for the past decade, had announced his intention to retire last year, when he turned 75. On Tuesday, Mansell said in retirement he will live at St. Augustine Church rectory in Glastonbury. New Milford's Miller praised Mansell for his work with the poor, like taking an old Hartford school and turning it into affordable housing. "I've worked with him for the last 12 years. He is probably one of the world's greatest gentlemen," Miller said. "I was in a very bad car crash shortly after he came to Hartford. Three days after the crash, he was on the phone with me asking if I was all right. I'm going to miss him. He's a great guy. He'll sit 1,500 people down at a dinner and when the gathering ends he'll have shaken every hand. That's how he is." The new bishop's appointment follows by a six weeks the installation of the Most Rev. Frank J. Caggiano, as the head of the Bridgeport Diocese. Caggiano, 54, a native of Brooklyn, N.Y., became Fairfield County's diocese's fifth bishop when Bishop William E. Lori left to become Baltimore's archbishop. Bridgeport waited 16 months for a new bishop; Monsignor Jerald A. Doyle had administered the 400,000 member diocese in the interim. Asked about sex abuse scandals in the Toledo diocese he has headed since 2003, Blair said his predecessor had removed several priests, "and I had to remove several as well, and there is a great process of healing underway in Toledo." The archbishop-designee was asked about the "new direction" that Pope Francis has taken the Catholic church. "He has re-energized Catholics with clear, direct statements of fundamental truths," Blair said. Then he offered an example of the pope's sense of humor. When Pope Francis was asked by a mother how to get her grown son to move out of her home, he replied, "Madam, just stop ironing his shirts,'" Blair said.
|
.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.