Whispers in the loggia: For Hartford, It's Lenny Time – Pope Taps Toledo's Blair for Conn. Pallium

Filling a strategically important seat in American Catholicism's now-faded Northeastern flagship, at Roman Noon this Tuesday the Pope named Bishop Leonard Blair, 64 – the Detroit native and longtime Vatican staffer who's led of Ohio's Toledo church since 2003 – as the fifth archbishop of Hartford.



The third US archbishop tapped by date to Francis, Blair succeeds Archbishop Henry Mansell, who reached the retirement age of 75 a year ago this month. Head of the 700,000-member flock comprising most of Connecticut's western half since 2003, the Bronx-born prelate first made his name as auxiliary and vicar-general of New York under John Cardinal O'Connor, who undertook a ferocious (and ultimately futile) lobbying effort in his final months to have Mansell named his successor in Gotham.



A protege of the now-retired Cardinal Edmund Szoka who served as the Michigander's secretary during Szoka's days as head of the prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See and Governor of Vatican City, the archbishop-elect is best known in the wider discourse as a lead player in the Holy See's doctrinal probe of the LCWR, the principal "umbrella-group" for the superiors of the nation's communities of sisters. In 2008, Blair was tapped by Rome to conduct the initial inquest into LCWR's adherence to certain aspects of church teaching, at whose conclusion he became one of two bishop-assistants to the CDF's delegate for the five-year "reform" process, Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle.



The traditional Appointment Day presser slated for 10am, Hartford Chancery has already announced the installation date for Monday, December 16th. As ever, more to come.



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by Rocco Palmo via Whispers in the Loggia