Bishop J.A. Francis; Led Verbum Dei High

Bishop Joseph A. Francis, the priest who founded Verbum Dei High School in Watts and was one of the nation’s first black Roman Catholic bishops, has died. He was 74.

Francis, who had worked for the past 20 years in the Newark, N.J., archdiocese, died Monday while walking on a treadmill in his Montclair, N.J., home. An archdiocese spokeswoman said the bishop had a history of heart problems.

He had been named auxiliary bishop in New Jersey in 1976 by Pope Paul VI, and retired two years ago after several heart bypass operations.

Francis was the principal author of “Brothers and Sisters to Us,” the U.S. bishops’ 1979 pastoral letter on racism, and he lectured around the world on justice and peace.

When he was ordained a priest in 1950, Francis was only the 35th African American to attain that rank. When he became a bishop in 1976, he was only the fourth black serving at that level in the country, and at his death, he was one of only 13 black bishops in the United States.

Serving as auxiliary bishop in Newark, Francis often said, was the second great challenge in his life.

The first was establishing and administering Verbum Dei High School. He was the first African American in the nation to serve as principal of a Catholic high school.

“Students, parents and residents of the area are as enthusiastic as I am with this wonderful place. Our rate of absenteeism is one of the lowest in the city,” Francis told The Times shortly after the college preparatory school opened with 140 students in 1964.

Surrounded by lumberyards, cabinet shops and a tire factory, Verbum Dei was the first Catholic school constructed in a predominantly black area of Los Angeles. Its initial enrollment was 46% nonblack.

Francis took memories of the neighborhood with him when he went on to higher positions. When he was named a bishop and given a coat of arms, he placed the Watts Towers on the coat’s shield.

He chose the towers as his symbol, he told The Times, because “my presence in Watts was the most challenging and productive [period] of my life.”

“Those towers always fascinated me,” he said before a Los Angeles reception in 1976. “I’ve always found great inspiration from them every time I visit them.”

Francis was born in Lafayette, La., the son of a barber, and attended parochial school. He entered the Seminary of the Divine Word Father in Bay St. Louis, Miss., in 1936, and did college work at St. Mary’s Seminary in Techny, Ill. He later obtained a master’s degree from Catholic University of America in Washington.

During his teaching days, Francis coached high school baseball, basketball and football.

Between his years in Los Angeles and New Jersey, Francis served as provincial superior of the Western Province and then the Southern Province of the Divine Word Father order.

A Mass of Christian burial will be held for Francis today in Newark. He will be buried in Lafayette, La., on Saturday.