City Catholics Hail Archbishop Hicks—But Challenges Await New Leader

Pomp and circumstance of the Roman Catholic Church were on full display on Feb. 6 as Archbishop Ronald Hicks was installed as the new spiritual leader of the 2.5 million Catholics in the Archdiocese of New York in a ceremony at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

He’s replacing Cardinal Timothy Dolan who reached the mandatory retirement age.

The new archbishop, 58 years old, who was most recently the archbishop of a suburban Chicago diocese in Joliet, IL, spent five years as a missionary priest running an orphanage in El Salvador. He’s a fluent Spanish speaker. Marachi bands and songs in Spanish were heard often echoing off the the streets surrounding the cathedral during his installation mass. Hicks had requested that several hymns be sung in Spanish in the course of a bilingual service.

Cardinal Hicks refers often to his missionary roots which he said shaped his priesthood. “This is a call to be a missionary church not a country club,” Hicks said. “A club exists to serve its members. The Church exists, on the other hand, to go out and serve all people, on fire with faith with hope and charity, in the name of Jesus Christ. This is not a criticism. It’s simply an invitation to constantly renew who we are and rediscover why the Church exists.”

Hicks made the ceremonial three knocks on the huge bronze doors of St. Patrick’s Cathedral to be admitted to his installation Mass that began at 2 p.m. Inside, he was greeted inside by Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the papal nuncio to the U.S., the outgoing Cardinal Cardinal Dolan and 90 bishops and cardinals.

City Council speaker Julie Menin and Comptroller Mark Levine were among the elected officials on hand. Mayor Zohran Mamdani, citing scheduling conflicts, was absent.

Dolan, 76 years old had submitted his retirement papers to Pope Francis last year but it was not accepted by Pope Leo until last month. Feb. 6 happened to be Dolan’s 76th birthday and the congregation broke out in a rendition of Happy Birthday. Dolan usually a greagarious soul seemed genuinely humbled by the spontaneous song. During his 16 year tenure at the Archdiocese, he was seen as a leader of the conservative wing of the Catholic Church who twice did the invocation for President Donald Trump at his inauguration in 2017 and 2025 and was a featured speaker at the Republican convention in 2024.

Archbishop Hicks was a signer of the recent open letter from the US Conference of Catholic Bishops that was sharply critical of the immigration policies of President Donald Trump and most observers expect Hicks to adopt a more critical role than Dolan when it comes to Trump’s immigration policies.

Hicks is seen as closely aligned with the new Pope Leo, the first American to head the Catholic Church. The two had only met once prior to his appointment as archbishop, but they grew up only 14 miles apart in suburban Chicago.

Outside the cathedral, there was an unusually large contingent of Spanish speaking Catholics obviously energized by Hicks embrace of his Latin American missionary past.

Most of the crowds outside were highly enthusiastic. “Welcome our shepherd Archbishop Ronald Hicks,” read one newly pressed banner which extended “greetings from the Neocatechumenal Way.”

But there was at least one sign of discord, from a man in the crowd who carried a handmade sigh calling attention to the church’s still unresolved problems from the sexual abuse scandal. “HICKS SEX ABUSE NO. 1 ISSUE,” read a neatly printed sign on a pink poster board.

Robert Hoatson, the bearer of the sigh, said he was a former Christian Brother who ultimately entered the priesthood. But after 14 years as a parish priest, he said he was booted from the priesthood because he spoke out about the sexual abuse scandal. He said he himself was sexually abused.

He was sharply critical of Cardinal Dolan. “He did nothing to reach out to those who were abused by priests, brothers and nuns.” said Hoatson who today heads a non-proft, Road to Recovery, which helps victims of clergy sexual abuse.

Recently Dolan has apologized on behalf of the Archdiocese and said the proceeds from some recent sales of church properties will go towards a $300 million fund for past victims of clergy abuse. Hoatson said the amount raised so far is far short of what will be needed to settle with over 1,300 survivors of sexual abuse in the Archdiocese.

Shortly after he spoke with Straus News, the NYPD ejected Hoatson from the crowd, although there had been no signs of trouble before his evection.

Aside the sexual abuse crisis, the archdiocese has been under pressure as attendance at all religious institutions has fallen sharply in a post pandemic world and a slew of schools and churches were forced to shutter in recent years.

But if there were problems ahead, most of the faithful were optimistic. Caitlin Mullan who came from Elmhurst Queens said she was once a drug addict who was spiraling toward disaster until she found Jesus. and met an Irishman from County Tyrone, Ireland, who was a bartender. She said they’ve been married 30 years and have ten children. “it’s a miracle,” she said. “not the kids, the marriage.”

And as she stood on a freezing street corner, she sheld up a banner from St. Gabriel’s parish. “We’re here to welcome our new archbishop” she said, although technically her parish is in the Diocese of Brooklyn and not under the new Archbishop. But it is a sign that the Archbishop of New York has a pulpit and influence far beyond the three New York city boroughs (Manhattan, Bronx and Staten Island) and the seven northern suburban counties (Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Sullivan, Ulster and Westchester} that comprise the Archdiocese.

Inside the cathedral, the congregation erupted with a standing ovation when Dolan passed the traditional crozier, the shepherd’s staff, to Hicks near the start of the ceremony,.

At 4 p.m, with the two hour installation Mass concluded, the bells of St. Patrick’s Cathedral tolled. The archdiocese, with all its joys and problems, was now officially in the hands of Archbishop Ronald Hicks.