Ex-Chicagoan Passed Over For Head Of Bishops' Conference
BALTIMORE (CBS) - In what is being called a huge upset, Tucson, Ariz., bishop and Chicagoan Gerald Kicanas was passed over for the presidency of the U.S. Conference of Bishops, in favor of noted conservative New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan.
Chicago's Francis Cardinal George is the finishing his three-year term as president of the conference. He was expected to be succeeded by Kicanas, as the group generally elects the sitting vice president in succeeding the president.
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But Kicanas, who has a moderate style, lost to the conservative Dolan by a vote of 54 to 46 percent.
In Arizona, Kicanas had urged Catholic voters to ban gay marriage and joined anti-abortion rallies and events. However, he took a more conciliatory approach in some of the controversies that have polarized Catholics in recent years.
He has not denied Communion to any Catholic politicians and rejected calls to punish the president of the University of Notre Dame for honoring President Barack Obama, who supports abortion rights. Kicanas instead urged bishops and Catholic university presidents to start a discussion about their differences.
Dolan also does not outright deny the sacrament to dissenting Catholic lawmakers, but he is seen as a stricter defender of church orthodoxy in a style favored by many theological conservatives. By contrast, Kicanas was pilloried in the days leading up to the vote by right-wing Catholic bloggers, who urged readers to send protest faxes and leave messages for bishops at the hotel where they are meeting.
Dolan, 60, was installed as archbishop of New York just last year, after leading the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. Born in St. Louis, he was ordained in 1976. In 1985, he earned a doctorate in church history from Catholic University.
After working as a parish priest and professor, Dolan spent seven years as rector of the North American College in Rome, considered the West Point for U.S. priests, where he had studied for his own ordination. He is considered a talented public speaker and is very popular among his fellow bishops and priests.
Kicanas is the former rector of Mundelein Seminary at the University of St. Mary of the Lake, in Mundelein.
In his time in Chicago, Kicanas took heat for ordaining the Rev. Daniel McCormack, despite allegations that McCormack had committed acts of sexual abuse.
McCormack pleaded guilty in 2007 to sexually abusing five boys and has been serving a five-year prison sentence. He abused the boys when he was pastor of St. Agatha Church on the West Side.
When McCormack was criminally charged in early 2006, Francis Cardinal George and the Chicago Archdiocese faced sharp criticism for not removing him from ministry upon the first allegations of abuse several months earlier.
CBS 2 Chief Correspondent Jay Levine contributed to this report.
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