Whispers in the loggia: For Tuscon, The Pope's "Tuesday Memo" – In Latest Border Run, Francis Looks to Kansas

Bringing the US' appointment docket back to life after the summer hiatus, at Roman Noon this Tuesday the Pope named Bishop Edward Weisenburger (left), 56 – the head of northwest Kansas' Salina diocese since 2012 – as the seventh bishop of Tucson, the 400,000-member fold comprising the Arizona Borderland.

Notably a key figure in the process which has now produced Blessed Stanley Rother – yet a low-key, surprise choice for this post – the Oklahoma City native succeeds Bishop Gerald Kicanas, who, in a rarity for these days, remained in office past his 76th birthday in August. Then again, as the new retiree's mother, Eva, has kept famously spry – marking her 105th birthday in June – the hat-makers clearly saw no need to rush.

The mother-diocese of what's become a growing Arizona church, Tucson is an almost unique nexus of the two defining challenges of this era in American Catholic history: the growth and vitality born of immigration, and the damage and need for rebuilding from revelations of a local history of sex-abuse and its coverup.

On the latter front, in 2004 – a year after Kicanas took office – the diocese became the second Stateside outpost to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy following a crush of over 30 lawsuits stretching back decades. In a striking turnaround, however, the Chicago native's transparency push scored a fresh sense of confidence, so much so that the diocesan appeal in the storm's wake raised record amounts.

In terms of immigration, meanwhile, amid one of the country's flashpoint venues over the charged issue, it remains telling that Tucson's nearby border-town of Nogales was chosen as the site for Cardinal Seán O'Malley's evocative 2014 Mass at the fence separating Mexico and the US, at which Kicanas (above) joined Francis' lead North American adviser in distributing Communion into hands stretched through the barrier's slats from the other side.

Developing – more to come.

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by Rocco Palmo via Whispers in the Loggia