Frank Heinz

Dallas Bishop Kevin Farrell Summoned to Vatican as Prefect of New Dicastery

Farrell's appointment goes into effect Sept. 1; new Dallas Bishop to be named at a later date

Dallas Bishop Kevin Farrell has been summoned by Pope Francis to work at the Vatican on behalf of Catholics around the world.

The Pope announced Wednesday that Farrell, 68, will be the Prefect of the newly established Vatican Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life.

The new office combines several Vatican offices into one and will work on behalf of lay people while also directing related institutes to give merciful care to the spiritually wounded.

“I’m humbled by the fact that he would entrust me with this new department,” said Farrell at a press conference Wednesday.

"The new dicastery will focus on the work of the universal Church in the promotion of the laity and the apostolate of the laity and for the pastoral care of the family in accordance with the Pope's recent apostolic exhortation, Amoris Laetitia, the Joy of Love, and the support of human life," according to a statement from the Catholic Diocese of Dallas.

During his press conference, he recounted his shock when he first received a phone call from the Pontiff.

“And my assistant, administrative assistant, came in and said, ‘the Pope’s on the telephone, and I felt like saying, ‘Yeah, yeah'. Eventually she did put on the Pope and he told me that he would like me to go to Rome because Dallas needed a much better Bishop than I am," said Farrell to a room of media who erupted in laughter.

Farrell said he spoke on the phone with the Pope for about five minutes and later traveled to the Vatican and met with him for two hours about his new role. In a statement Wednesday, Farrell said he was "extremely humbled" to be selected to lead the dicastery and that he was "grateful for the Holy Father's confidence."

Bishop of Dallas Kevin J. Farrell discusses his promotion to prefect of a Vatican dicastery following the appointment announced Wednesday by Pope Francis.

“It is my home, it is a place I love. I love the people, I’ve loved the work, I enjoy it immensely,” Farrell, who has served Dallas' one million Catholics since 2007, said.

The Bishop also said "the strong faith, kindness and generosity of the people in the Diocese of Dallas surpassed all of my expectations" and that he was confident Pope Francis would "find the right man to serve as the new chief shepherd" in Dallas.

"For more than a decade, Catholic Charities of Dallas has had the distinct honor of working closely with Bishop Farrell to help those in need across Dallas," said Dave Woodyard, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of Dallas. "He is a humble servant and a strong advocate for the thousands of people who need hope and help in life - from children in poverty to immigrants who need a voice to families desperate for education and safe assistance. We wish him all the best and feel blessed to have had his counsel and partnership."

“Thank you all, thank you all so much. You all have been very good to me in my 10 years here . . . and I’m sure we will meet again,” Farrell said, as the room continuously clapped for the Bishop and he proceeded to shake hands with reporters and photographers around the room.

Farrell, whose brother is also a top Vatican official, will be the highest ranking American prelate serving at the Vatican when his appointment becomes effective Sept. 1. Auxiliary Bishop Greg Kelly will lead the diocese until Farrell's successor is named.

Pope Outlines Vision for Promoting Life, Family Issues

Pope Francis also named an Italian moderate, Monsignor Vincenzo Paglia, to head two academic institutes affiliated with the new laity office -- one dealing with bioethics, the other with marriage -- and told Paglia he should focus on promoting the merciful side of church doctrine.

Combined, the appointments signal a more moderate direction for Vatican offices responsible for hot-button, culture war issues such as abortion, contraception, marriage and divorce.

Farrell is known as a moderate with a warm, friendly approach that balances a strong emphasis on social justice issues with a defense of church teaching on issues such as abortion. Paglia, too, is a moderate, an Italian who was responsible for investigating and pushing through the beatification of slain El Salvador Archbishop Oscar Romero over opposition from Latin American conservatives who accused Romero of Marxist sympathies.

The two institutes Paglia now heads -- the Pontifical Academy for Life and the John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family --were created during the pontificate of the conservative Polish pope to assert church doctrine on core sexual morals, bioethics and marriage. The institutes' members were often hard-liners and their conferences often featured only like-minded academics.

In a letter to Paglia, Francis said he wanted the institutes to focus on imbuing church teaching on life and marriage issues with mercy, opening dialogue with other academic and scientific centers, Christian and not.

"Bowing before the wounds of mankind, to understand them, treat them and heal them is the job of a church that believes in the light and strength of the resurrected Christ, able to go even to places of tension and conflict like a field hospital," Francis wrote to Paglia.

Farrell's new office is expected to work in tandem with Paglia's institutes and will include many lay Catholics in top positions. That's part of the pope's aim to reinvigorate the participation of ordinary Catholics in the church and get away from what he has long criticized as an overly "clericalized" hierarchy.

The statutes of Farrell's office, released in June, say it will have three sections: laity, family and life. The life section is designed to coordinate initiatives promoting "responsible procreation" and supporting initiatives to help women choose alternatives to abortion.

Farrell has defended Francis' emphasis on mercy over divisive social issues in the face of criticism from some American conservatives who dismiss the pope as confusing and insufficiently faithful.

Farrell seems very much on message with Francis on some key issues. He has spoken out for the rights of immigrants, including writing in 2010 on his blog that "immigration reform is a moral issue."

He drew the ire of many Texas conservatives when he praised President Barack Obama's executive action this year tightening gun regulations. Farrell, writing on his blog, criticized a new open carry state gun law as a sad reflection of "the cowboy mentality."

When the U.S. Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal nationwide last year, Farrell wrote that the church would never accept gay marriage, but also emphasized that gays and lesbians should be treated with respect and compassion. Both positions are in line with Francis and church teaching.

"We don't all have to agree with each other. We just have to treat each other with respect and build bridges," Farrell said Wednesday.

Farrell and his brother, Brian, both were ordained as priests of the Legion of Christ religious order. Kevin Farrell left the scandal-marred order in the early 1980s and incardinated into the Archdiocese of Washington. Brian Farrell remains a Legion priest and is the No. 2 in the Vatican's Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity.

NBC 5's Frank Heinz and Kristin Dickerson contributed to this story along with AP Religion Writer Rachel Zoll in New York and AP writer Jamie Stengle in Dallas.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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