"Amy Kazmin in Rome
Published YESTERDAY
As archbishop of New York for the past 16 years, Cardinal Timothy Dolan emerged as a US political influencer and Fox News favourite who publicly repudiated the Democrats and led a conservative Catholic embrace of Donald Trump and the Republican party.
Now Pope Leo XIV, the first American spiritual leader of the world’s 1.4bn Catholics, has picked a cleric of a very different ilk to replace Dolan in US Catholicism’s highest-profile job as he puts his stamp on a US church roiled by Trump’s populist Maga movement. Analysts say the choice of Chicago native Ronald Hicks as Dolan’s successor is a clear signal of Pope Leo’s desire for a course correction in the US church, which many progressive Catholics, including some in the Vatican, felt had allied itself too closely with the Republican party.
Many church members were appalled a few months ago when Dolan described the slain conservative social media influencer and Trump supporter Charlie Kirk as “a modern day St Paul”.
FT.com
Published YESTERDAY
As archbishop of New York for the past 16 years, Cardinal Timothy Dolan emerged as a US political influencer and Fox News favourite who publicly repudiated the Democrats and led a conservative Catholic embrace of Donald Trump and the Republican party.
Now Pope Leo XIV, the first American spiritual leader of the world’s 1.4bn Catholics, has picked a cleric of a very different ilk to replace Dolan in US Catholicism’s highest-profile job as he puts his stamp on a US church roiled by Trump’s populist Maga movement. Analysts say the choice of Chicago native Ronald Hicks as Dolan’s successor is a clear signal of Pope Leo’s desire for a course correction in the US church, which many progressive Catholics, including some in the Vatican, felt had allied itself too closely with the Republican party.
Many church members were appalled a few months ago when Dolan described the slain conservative social media influencer and Trump supporter Charlie Kirk as “a modern day St Paul”.
FT.com