Roman Catholic Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA
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The Roman Catholic Archdiocese for the Military Services, provides the Roman Catholic Church's pastoral and spiritual services to those serving in the United States armed forces or other federal services overseas. This military ordinariate is a special diocese canonically erected by Pope Pius XII in 1939 for members and others employed by the United States Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Marine Corps, Navy, the Veterans Health Administration and its patients, and for Americans in government service overseas. The Archdiocese for the Military Services was created by Pope John Paul II in 1985 and incorporated under the laws of the State of Maryland that same year.
Its Ordinary is the Archbishop for the Military Services; the Archbishop is Timothy P. Broglio, a Cleveland native. According to the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (http://www.usccb.org), Archbishop Broglio was formerly the Apostolic Nuncio to the Dominican Republic and thus also the Apostolic Delegate to Puerto Rico. The Archbishop is assisted by several auxiliary bishops which oversee chaplain priests serving throughout the world. The Archdiocese maintains its offices in Washington, DC but has no territorial boundaries or "seat". The Archdiocese has no cathedral or bishop's church. Rather, the Archdiocese has jurisdiction wherever American men and women in uniform serve. The jurisdiction of the Archdiocese extends to any United States government property both in the continental United States and abroad, including all military installations and U.S. embassies, consulates and other diplomatic missions.
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[edit] History
Prior to the creation of the Military Ordinariate and then the Archdiocese for the Military Services, the armed forces of the United States was served by an informal corps of volunteer priests. Beginning in 1917, the spiritual care of those in military service fell to the Military Ordinariate, the equivalent of a personal vicariate apostolic - that is, a particular church the membership of which is defined by some personal quality (as in this case being a member or a dependent of a member of the armed services) that is headed by a legate of the pope. Originally, the ordinariate was headed by then-Bishop Patrick Hayes, an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of New York who served double duty as papal military vicar for the United States beginning on November 24, 1917.
Hayes was chosen because New York was the primary port of embarkation for U.S. troops leaving for Europe and therefore a convenient contact point for Catholic chaplains serving with them. When John Cardinal Farley, archbishop of New York, died, Hayes was appointed as his successor and simply kept the additional title and duty of military vicar. The post remained, therefore, an additional duty of the archbishop of New York from Hayes' time until Terence Cardinal Cooke began plans to separate it as its own jurisdiction in the early 1980s, plans he was unable to carry out before his death in 1983. His successor, John Cardinal O'Connor, a former Navy chaplain, former chief of chaplains (the military's title for its own senior chaplain officer) and former auxiliary bishop for the military, then assisted in creating the separate Archdiocese for the Military Services in 1985 and participated in the selection of its first own archbishop.
[edit] Prelature
[edit] Ordinaries
- Patrick Cardinal Hayes, Apostolic Vicar (24 November 1917-10 March 1919)
- Francis Cardinal Spellman, Archbishop of New York (11 December 1939-2 December 1967)
- John Francis O'Hara, CSC, Military Delegate(11 December 1939-10 March 1945)*
- Terence Cardinal Cooke, Archbishop of New York (4 April 1968-6 October 1983)
- John Joseph Thomas Ryan, First Archbishop of the Archdiocese for Military Services (16 March 1985-14 May 1991)
- Joseph Thomas Dimino, Archbishop for the Military Services (14 May 1991-12 August 1997)
- Edwin Frederick O'Brien, Archbishop for the Military Services (12 August 1997-12 July 2007)
- Timothy P. Broglio, Archbishop for the Military Services (25 January 2008-present)
*O'Hara was appointed "military delegate" at the same time that Spellman was appointed "military vicar," essentially making Bishop O'Hara something a bit more than the vicar general under Archbishop Spellman's jurisdiction.
[edit] Auxiliary bishops
- William Tibertus McCarty, C.Ss.R. (1943 - 1947)
- William Richard Arnold (1945 - 1965)
- James Henry Ambrose Griffiths (1949 - 1955)
- Philip Joseph Furlong (1955 - 1971)
- William Joseph Moran (1965 - 1981)
- James Jerome Killeen (1975 - 1978)
- John Joseph O'Connor (1979 - 1983)
- Lawrence Joyce Kenney (1983 - 1990)
- Angelo Thomas Acerra, O.S.B. (1983 - 1990)
- Joseph Thomas Dimino (1983 - 1991)
- Francis Xavier Roque (1983 - 2004)
- John Gavin Nolan (1987 - 1997)
- John Joseph Glynn (1991 - 2002)
- José de Jesús Madera Uribe, M.Sp.S. (1991 - 2004)
- John Joseph Kaising (2000 - 2007)
- Joseph W. Estabrook (2004 - Present)
- Richard Brendan Higgins (2004 - Present)
[edit] Resources
