Lots of rumors are flying around all over the place lately. Many blogs have been reporting—and the mainstream media is starting to catch up—that Archbishop Harry Flynn of Minneapolis-St. Paul will soon have a coadjutor bishop. The most common name being bandied about lately is Bishop Sam Aquila of Fargo. While some people say that Flynn requested the coadjutor of Rome because of his advancing age (he is 73), other reports claim that the initiative came from Rome because of Flynn’s missteps on things like Communion for pro-abortion politicians and Rainbow Sashers. (Aquila comes down, like Bishop Michael Sheridan of Colorado Springs and Archbishop Raymond Burke of St. Louis, on the side of refusing Communion to persistently pro-abortion pols.) Tom Szyskiewicz seems pretty certain of this rumor:
Bishop Samuel Aquila of Fargo will be coming to the Twin Cities as the archbishop. My prediction is that the announcement will be made on the 13th or the 20th.
While the reports are saying that Archbishop Flynn sought a coadjutor, the reality is that this was something pushed from the Vatican. Let’s just say that a certain someone in Rome was rather unhappy with the Archbishop’s response when it came to a Communion issue.
I’m not sure if I buy that explanation completely, although it’s possible that the process was speeded up by a mutual desire to see Flynn begin the process of turning over the archdiocese to another.
Curial changes too
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