NOTE BETWEEN PRINTED EDITIONS
by CATHOLIC ACTION LEAGUE OF MASSACHUSETTS
POPE APPOINTS PROVIDENCE
BISHOP RICHARD HENNING AS
ARCHBISHOP OF BOSTON
This morning, August 5, 2024, Pope Francis appointed the Bishop of Providence, the Most Reverend Richard G. Henning, as the new Archbishop of Boston and Metropolitan of the Province of Boston. He will succeed Cardinal Sean O’Malley, who turned 80 on June 29th.
The Archdiocese of Boston comprises five counties in eastern Massachusetts, while the Province of Boston encompasses seven dioceses in four New England states—Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont.
Ordained a priest of the Diocese of Rockville Center, Henning, 59, graduated from Saint John’s University and Immaculate Conception Seminary, in New York. He received his licentiate from the Catholic University of America and his doctorate from the Angelicum in Rome.
After returning to Rockville Center in 2007, Henning became a seminary professor and a parish administrator, and later, in 2012, a seminary rector.
From June of 2018 until November of 2022, Henning served as Auxiliary Bishop of Rockville Center. He was appointed Coadjutor Bishop of Providence on November 23, 2022, succeeding to the See of Providence, six months later, on May 1, 2023.
He will be the tenth Ordinary, and the seventh archbishop, of the Diocese of Boston, which was established in 1808.
The Catholic Action League called Henning’s appointment “an unexpected choice, given rumors about the vetting of candidates from the more progressivist wing of the American hierarchy.”
Catholic Action League Executive Director C. J. Doyle made the following comment:
“The Catholic Action League wishes to offer its prayers for, and extend its congratulations and best wishes to, Archbishop-elect Richard Henning on his appointment by the Pope to the See of Boston.
Archbishop Henning faces the daunting task of reversing a two decade downward spiral of church closings, school closings, parish consolidations and significant losses of institutional infrastructure—which included the final collapse of the Catholic hospital system and the shuttering of the only Catholic adoption agency in Greater Boston—that marked the 21 year tenure of Cardinal O’Malley as archbishop.
He also must find a way to improve the finances of the archdiocese, which, though it has climbed out of deficit spending to achieve an operating surplus, still relies on the on-going liquidation of real estate assets to help balance its annual budget.
The League hopes that Archbishop Henning will reverse the non-compliance policy of his predecessor regarding Catholics in Political Life, the directive of the national bishops conference which prohibits Catholic prelates and Catholic institutions from giving ‘awards, honors and platforms’ to ‘those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles.’
When it came to violations of this prohibition, Cardinal O’Malley has been one of most egregious offenders in the American episcopate. This fact, perhaps, can be attributed to his reliance on advice from establishment- connected, left-of-center major donors, like the late Jack Connors.
O’Malley actually gave awards to such pro-abortion political figures as the late Boston Mayor Thomas Menino and former Boston Mayor and U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh.
Recently, O’Malley showcased Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey at fundraisers for Catholic Charities and the Catholic Schools Foundation, despite her attacks on crisis pregnancy centers, some of which are sponsored by O’Malley’s own archdiocese.
Faithful, pro-life Catholics hope that Archbishop Henning will be his own man, a captive of neither chancery bureaucrats nor deep-pocketed contributors.
They also hope and pray that his tenure will be marked by the promotion of a Culture of Life, and not by episcopal complicity in a corporate culture of institutional betrayal.”
