Pope Francis on Monday named Cardinal Robert W. McElroy, Bishop of San Diego, to be the next Roman Catholic archbishop of Washington, moving one of his most vocal allies on immigration to one of the most prominent positions in the American church.
The move, announced in the Vatican’s daily bulletin, comes as President-elect Donald J. The two weeks before Trump’s inauguration comes at a critical moment and sends a signal about Pope Francis’ priorities. Many powerful American Catholics, including Vice President-elect J.D. Vance, have aligned themselves with Mr. Trump’s efforts against immigration and abortion.
Cardinal McElroy, 70, is a longtime supporter of the Pope’s pastoral agenda, and is known to speak regularly on the inclusion of immigrants, women and LGBTQ people in the Catholic Church and the United States.
He succeeds Cardinal Wilton Gregory, 77, the first African-American to be made a cardinal. A member of the supreme governing body of the church.
In December, as Mr. Trump promised Cardinal McElroy and 11 other California bishops call for another crackdown on immigration issued a statement In support of “our migrant brothers and sisters”.
“We want to assure you that we and our Mother, the Church, stand with you in these days of anxiety,” they wrote, promising to “advocate for your dignity and family unity.”
His appearance in Washington will contrast with Mr. Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019 and pushed a staunch anti-immigrant agenda during the campaign last year. Along with Mr. Trump, Mr. Vance called for mass deportations, promised to end legal immigration programs and spread baseless rumors that Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, were stealing and eating pets.
Mr. Vance represents the conservative wing of the church, which has gained strength in Republican circles as it pushes back against the rise of secularism.
As Bishop of the Diocese of San Diego, On the border with Mexico, Cardinal McElroy has a history of standing with immigrants, who represent a vital constituency for the Catholic Church globally and in the US.
As an undergraduate at Harvard University, he studied with Oscar Handlin, a leading scholar who changed the public’s views about the role of immigration in American history.
Shortly after Mr. Trump won the 2016 presidential election, Cardinal McElroy, a new bishop in San Diego appointed by Pope Francis, told a Catholic immigration conference that Mr. Trump’s promise to deport millions of immigrants “stands despite that.” It was “unimaginable”. ,
He It has been told Mr. Trump’s policy is “an act of injustice that will tarnish our national honor in the same way as the United States’ progressive dispossession of Native American peoples and Japanese interdiction.”
He too spoke That’s when President Trump attempted to end the program that protects from deportation about 700,000 immigrants, known as Dreamers, who came to the country as children.
As other Catholic bishops sought to make abortion their major issue, Cardinal McElroy often argued that abortion was one of several important priorities of Catholic moral teaching. When conservative bishops hit out at President Biden, America’s second Catholic president, with a proposal to deprive politicians of communion because of their support of abortion rights in 2021, he pushed back, saying that under such a proposal, The sacrament, “which seeks to unite us,” will become a sign of division for millions of Catholics.”
Cardinal McElroy has “made a case for”fundamental inclusionof women and LGBTQ people in church life and leadership, much to the displeasure of conservatives. In 2022, Pope Francis made him a cardinal, and is therefore eligible to vote on the pontiff’s successor.
Previous leaders of the Washington Archdiocese have handled the inherently political nature of the posting in their own ways. A scholar of American history by training, Cardinal McElroy is a rare prelate who holds a doctorate in political science from Stanford University, and who has not shied away from contemporary controversies in church or nation.
He wrote, “Our political society is poisoned by tribalism, which is draining our energy as a people and threatening our democracy.” America magazineA Jesuit publication, in 2023. “And that poison has entered destructively into the life of the Church.”
Although the Archdiocese of Washington is home to about half as many Catholics as the Diocese of San Diego, it is one of the most prominent postings in the country. The archdiocese includes the nation’s capital as well as major institutions such as the Catholic University of America and North America’s largest Catholic church, the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
Cardinal Gregory moved to Washington in 2019 from Atlanta, where he was archbishop, following a tumultuous period when church leaders in Washington were at the center of America’s sex abuse crisis. Pope Francis elevated him to the College of Cardinals in 2020, at a time of widespread calls for racial justice across the country and within the Church.
Elisabetta Povoledo Contributed to the reporting.