Selection of New Bishop Cloaked in Veil of Secrecy

When asked to describe the type of clergyman they would like to see become the next bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego, most local Catholics have no difficulty painting a detailed--if perhaps overly lofty--portrait of the successor to Bishop Leo T. Maher.

“The answers you usually get whenever you ask that question end up being a cross somewhere between Lee Iacocca and St. Francis of Assisi,” said Father Thomas Reese, a fellow at Georgetown University’s Woodstock Theological Center. “Or, as we sometimes say, what they’re looking for is Jesus with an MBA from Harvard.”

But, although Catholics generally have a good--and ambitious--notion of the archetypical bishop, most know little about the potential candidates themselves or the process by which priests are elevated to one of the highest ranks in the church hierarchy.

Indeed, as one church theologian put it bluntly: “About all most people, including a lot of priests, know about the process is that the appointee probably will be someone they know little about, if anything, and that they’ll have had almost nothing to say about it.”

With Maher only 15 months away from the church’s mandatory retirement age of 75, Catholic leaders in this country and at the Vatican are already deeply involved in searching for his successor--a process at once carefully structured but also steeped in mystique and secretiveness.

“From the time Matthias was chosen by lot to replace Judas as one of the Twelve Apostles, the process by which bishops . . . are selected has been an important and often controversial issue in the church,” Reese writes in “Archbishop,” a book on the subject to be published this spring.

Church documents, Reese said, “describe the process in skeletal outline,” and even those few details are partially obscured by the fact that participants are bound by a vow of silence about the candidates under consideration.

That order notwithstanding, names frequently leak out in advance of appointments, though, as in secular politics, it often is unclear whether the names mentioned are those of serious contenders or are simply the result of pure conjecture and lobbying by a particular priest’s boosters.

Guidelines approved by the Vatican in 1972, however, combined with details that have emerged from past American bishop selections, provide at least a general overview of the process that will determine who replaces Maher as the head of the 460,000-member, 98-church diocese, which includes San Diego and Imperial counties.

Although Pope John Paul II will name Maher’s successor, the real choice, church leaders acknowledge, likely will be made by Archbishop Pio Laghi, the Washington-based apostolic delegate to the United States. The Pope’s primary effect, Reese and others contend, lies more in setting the tone and criteria by which candidates are nominated and evaluated rather than direct case-by-case involvement in picking any of the about 300 active U. S. bishops and auxiliaries.

After confidential consultation with clerical and lay leaders about a diocese’s needs and the background of potential candidates, Laghi compiles a terna , a list of three finalists ranked in order of preference, to be sent to the Vatican. There, the list is reviewed by a 37-member Congregation for Bishops, which in turn forwards the recommendations to the Pope’s desk for the final decision.

Theoretically, the Vatican bishop panel can reject the three names and request that Laghi, who is also called the “nuncio,” submit a new slate, which, in fact, sometimes happens, albeit very infrequently.

Most times, however, the clergyman selected comes from the initial recommendations submitted by the apostolic delegate, with the appointee usually being the No. 1 name on the list.

“The congregation certainly can and does conduct its own investigations,” said Father Bernard Yarrish, an aide to Laghi. “But it’s always the hope that the congregation trusts the judgment of the nuncio, who has already done an exhaustive review and is actually on the scene.”

Little More Than Rubber Stamp

Although Yarrish responds diplomatically to the ticklish question of where the decision is really made, some priests go so far as to suggest that the Vatican usually does little more than rubber-stamp Laghi’s recommendations. The archbishops and cardinals who serve on the Congregation for Bishops, they say, recognize that his choices stem from extensive interviews with those who know the candidates best.

Moreover, given the magnitude of the Pope’s overall duties, many priests doubt that he plays a pivotal role in selecting bishops, with the possible exception of instances where he personally knows a candidate or in the case of high-profile positions in large dioceses such as New York or Chicago.

Framing that issue another way, they say that, on any given day, the Pope certainly has more pressing matters on his mind than who will be the next bishop of San Diego.

“I think these things are pretty much a cut-and-dried deal by the time they reach Rome,” said Msgr. Charles Dollen of Poway.

Although church officials cringe at comparisons between the bishop-selection procedure and the secular political world, there are obvious similarities.

Ideology of the candidate is at least as important--if not more so--in selecting a bishop as it is in conventional politics. And, just as occurs in political circles whenever there are public-office vacancies, Maher’s approaching retirement has inspired widespread speculation and rumors, replete with possible names and dates, within local religious groups about his successor.

“It’s a question much on the lips these days,” remarked the Rev. Douglas Regin of St. Francis Church in Vista.

In public politics, an acorn of fact can sprout an oak of hypothesis. Demonstrating that the maxim is equally applicable to religious politics, the recent comments and actions of Maher and others have been closely scrutinized by church leaders and the press alike for tips on where the selection process stands, often spawning speculative scenarios.

For example, the diocese’s planned purchase of a Kensington home for the new bishop has led to speculation that an appointment may be imminent. Similarly, the fact that both Maher and Msgr. I. Brent Eagen, the diocese’s chancellor, now are in Rome has raised eyebrows and caused knowing nods, despite the fact that the visit is part of a regularly scheduled pilgrimage.

Aside from the public’s lack of a direct elective role in the choice of bishops, the most notable departure from “normal” politics lies in the fact that bishop candidates are heavily discouraged from promoting themselves. Indeed, most candidates generally are unaware that they are even under consideration.

Other Names Crop Up

“A candidate would not necessarily be privy to the discussions, even though his future is involved,” said Bishop John T. Steinbock of Santa Rosa, who has been mentioned as a possible contender for Maher’s post. (Again, in one of those details that some see as significant but that others dismiss as simply coincidental, Maher served as bishop of Santa Rosa for seven years before being transferred to San Diego in 1969.)

Several other names also persistently crop up in discussions about successors to Maher--among them, Auxiliary Bishop G. Patrick Ziemann of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles; Bishop Michael Sheehan of Lubbock, Tex.; and Msgr. Lawrence Purcell, who formerly served here but now is based in Rome.

Regin, however, cautions that the names mentioned usually are a combination of actual contenders and others whose resumes, because they are well-matched to a diocese’s needs, make them logical possibilities--even though they are never in the running.

Although the basic procedural steps in the selection are generally known, other critical facets remain less clear and only vaguely understood. As a result, answers to a number of key questions--precisely how potential candidates emerge, who is queried about their qualifications and what happens during the final closed-door stages in the Vatican--hinge more on educated guesswork than firsthand knowledge.

The screening of bishop candidates is especially shrouded in secrecy--primarily to protect individuals’ reputations and to guard against the process’s becoming overly political, according to church leaders. However, others suggest that some church officials’ desire to keep a tight rein on the process, and thereby their own influence, also is a factor.

Akin to Sports’ Draft List

Information about possible future bishops routinely flows from dioceses throughout the country to Laghi’s Washington office, providing something akin to a sports team’s draft list.

Under the leadership of the bishop, a diocese’s priest council--called a Presbyteral Council in San Diego--regularly prepares lists of priests whom the panel’s members consider worthy of advancement. In San Diego’s case, those names are usually forwarded to the apostolic delegate, Los Angeles Archbishop Roger Mahony or San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn. Quinn served here as auxiliary bishop in the 1960s.

Maher did not specifically ask the council for advice about possible successors in recent months, according to Father Mark Campbell, the council’s former chairman. But, since Maher’s replacement is expected to come from outside the diocese, that would not be unusual.

When a vacancy is about to occur, the bishop sends a report on the diocese’s condition, needs and the desired qualities of its leader to the apostolic delegate, along with the names of priests and others who could be consulted on the subject. An 82-page report that Maher delivered to the Vatican last year provides much of that basic background, Campbell said.

On the basis of those reports, Laghi’s staff then sends questionnaires to religious and lay leaders inquiring about the candidates’ physical, intellectual and spiritual characteristics--a process that Yarrish said can last from six months to two years. The archbishop and bishops of the province where the vacancy exists, as well as the leadership of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, are among those usually consulted.

Adherence to Orthodoxy

Besides helping judge candidates’ leadership qualities, the questionnaires also are intended to carefully measure their adherence to church orthodoxy--particularly on sensitive questions such as women’s role in the church, abortion, birth control and the marriage of priests. Any priest who has taken a liberal public position contrary to the church’s stance on those litmus issues, church officials say, need not worry about receiving “the call” to become a bishop.

Another wrinkle in the search for Maher’s replacement is that Maher has asked the Vatican to name a so-called co-adjutor--in essence, an heir apparent who would share diocesan duties with Maher until he retires in July, 1990, when he would automatically become the diocese’s leader.

Although similar to the normal bishop-selection process, the method by which co-adjutors are named conceivably could give Maher a slightly stronger voice in selecting his replacement than he would have otherwise, church officials said.

Because a co-adjutor will work for months or even years side by side with a bishop, rather than simply succeed an already-retired predecessor, decision-makers might be inclined to give at least marginally greater weight to the bishop’s own recommendations, priests and other church officials said.

Like other bishops nearing retirement, Maher has already submitted the names of potential successors to Laghi’s office. But, if any of those names is selected, only Maher and a handful of other top church officials would be in a position to know whether he played a key role in handpicking his successor.

Only 4 Co-Adjutors

However, Laghi’s three finalists could just as easily differ from Maher’s recommendations. Moreover, although there has been persistent speculation that a co-adjutor may be named this spring, is it not known whether Laghi has forwarded the matter to Rome yet, or even whether the co-adjutor request itself will be granted.

There are now only four co-adjutors in this country’s 189 dioceses. The rarity with which that particular method of succession is employed--and the fact that it occurs most often in cases where the bishop has a health problem or the diocese is embroiled in serious controversy--causes some to question the likelihood of one being appointed here.

But if local Catholics are reduced to guessing over specific names, they believe that an analysis of the diocese and its needs yields a relatively accurate picture of the candidates’ likely background.

Their consensus portrait envisions a new bishop whose moderate-to-conservative theology matches San Diego’s and the church’s own conservatism. Given San Diego’s proximity to the border and the large number of Latinos in the church, the new bishop almost certainly will be fluent in Spanish, they say. A background in education would be useful, they add, in a diocese that includes a major Catholic university--the University of San Diego.

Many priests, speaking of the need for a bishop who could guide the diocese well into the next century, believe the appointee will range in age from the mid-40s to his early 50s. And Maher’s own low profile, combined with the negative publicity that the diocese has received in recent years--highlighted by allegations of drug use and homosexuality among priests and murky financial accounting--also might call for a more outgoing, public relations-conscious style that could enable the new bishop to become a greater community presence, they add.

Contrast to Outgoing Bishop

“It’s not uncommon to find a new bishop being something of a contrast to the outgoing one,” Reese said. “If you have someone who’s a financial expert but people are always asking, ‘Bishop who?’ they’ll often look for someone who’s more outgoing.”

As Catholics have become more sophisticated about the selection of bishops--”Fifty years ago, some people probably thought you got a telegram from heaven,” Reese joked--there have been occasional calls to make the process more public and democratic.

But, even many of those who are not enthralled with the current system’s secrecy find that option distasteful, fearing that making the process more public would inevitably politicize it to an unacceptable degree.

“Could you imagine a popular priest whose parishioners mount a ‘Smith for Bishop’ campaign?” Dollen asked rhetorically. “Or could you imagine Republican and Democratic bishops?” He learned a valuable lesson in the pitfalls of popular elections, Dollen said, when bitter arguments broke out between parishioners seeking election to his small church’s Holy Name Society.

Reese added: “Whenever people say they’d like to elect bishops, my answer is, ‘Oh, so you’re so happy with the kind of people we’ve got in government that you’d like to do things the same way in the church?’ ”

‘Appears to Be Autocratic’

Although Reese concedes that the existing system “appears to be an autocratic process . . . on paper,” he argues that it nevertheless works reasonably well.

“What makes it work as well as it does is the good faith of the participants, who are concerned for the good of the church and recognize the problems that would result from imposing a bishop at odds with his priests and people,” Reese said. Checks and balances at various levels of the process also help guard against a bishop or small clique of chancery officials trying to push through an unpopular appointment, he added.

Many local priests, meanwhile, say that a thorough understanding of the process itself is less important than satisfaction with the result.

“What matters is getting the right person for the job, however that happens,” Regin said. “Besides, we usually end up getting someone totally different than we think, anyway.”