Since the 2010s, Catholics of the County of San Diego have been led by two men.
Pope Francis took charge of the World Church in 2013. Two years later, he made Robert Mcelroy the chief of the diocese of San Diego. And in the space of a few weeks, the two have disappeared.
The pope died on Monday, just after celebrating Easter on Saint-Pierre square and shortly after having moved Mcelroy to the national capital to take over the archdiocese of Washington.
“Today, the Church and the world have lost a real shepherd of souls,” said Mcelroy in a statement from his new house in Washington, DC “in the midst of our sadness to this death, we thank God for the penetrating grace that he brought among us.”
The decade of Mcelroy in San Diego – which included its ascent at the Cardinal College, the most upscale organism in the largest Christian church in the world – is a large part of the Pope’s heritage in Southern California. San Diego had never had a cardinal, and Mcelroy used his platform to support the Pope’s push for a more inclusive church.
This vision was particularly important for communities near the American-Mexican border, noted the auxiliary bishop of San Diego Michael Pham. “He took care of migrants and immigrants,” said Pham about the pontiff. “It’s a difficult time for all of us.”
The Catholics of all the County of San Diego described feeling both sorrow on the death and joy of the Pope about his lasting influence. Marta Flores, a 73-year-old secular chief at Notre-Dame de Guadalupe church, was delighted to imagine the arrival of the pontiff in paradise. “He is said to him:” Bravo, my good and faithful servant, “she said, a reference to the Gospel of Matthew.
Flores considers Francis’s papacy as a call for action. “He opened the church to the marginalized,” said Flores. “How can we keep his example alive?”
The condolences flocked throughout the day. Deacon Jim Vargas, leader of Father Joe’s villages, praised the Pope’s “compassion” for “our most vulnerable neighbors”. The American representative Scott Peters stressed that Francis emphasized the harmful effects of climate change.
South of the border, more than 100 Catholic churches and parishes in Tijuana, Rosarito and Tecate plan to ring the bells in unison on Monday evening in memory of the Pope.
Israel Ángeles Gil, a leader of the Archdiocese of Tijuana, recalled his university student in Rome at the time when the predecessor of Francis, Pope Benoît XVI, resigned. Gil was outside the Sistine Chapel when White Smoke began to blow a fireplace, signaling the election of a new pontiff, although he initially fought to hear what name had been called. Then he saw someone waving an Argentinian flag.
“This is how we learned that he was the first Latin American pope,” said Gil. The moment has filled him with hope.
Others in the region have personal memories. In 2015, several students from the St. John the Evangelist of Incinitas went to Italy with their choir director to sing for the Pope. During a rehearsal, Francis walked in an alley, tightened some of the hands of the girls and blessed them in Spanish. “It was one of the best days of my life,” said Lily Grochowiak, 9, at the time.
A diocesan spokesman said that a commemorative service is expected to arrive next week.
Francis’ death will probably delay efforts to make San Diego a new bishop.
Since Cardinal Mcelroy left last month for Washington, DC, the daily operations of the local church have been supervised by Pham, the auxiliary bishop who is now a director of the diocese. But this role has limits: administrators cannot appoint pastors to parishes, for example, nor order new priests.
These decisions must be made by a bishop and the bishops are chosen by the popes.
In the coming weeks, Catholic leaders around the world will meet to elect Francis’ successor. Only cardinals under the age of 80 are eligible to vote. Mcelroy, however, is 71.
“The church hurts, crying on this event which touches it in its deepest depths,” said on Monday at a press conference at the new metropolitan cathedral in Mexico. “But these are not tears of despair, but tears of Christian hope.”
Moreno Barrón said he was convinced that the next pontiff will be “the pope he needs at the moment in history”.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
