San Jose Bishop McGrath hospitalized after serious fall.
Spokeswoman: ‘Bishop McGrath is being treated for a slight fracture of a disc in his back’
San Jose Bishop Patrick J. McGrath, the spiritual leader of 640,000 Roman Catholics in Santa Clara County, was hospitalized Thursday after suffering a serious fall.
“Bishop McGrath is being treated for a slight fracture of a disc in his back,” Liz Sullivan, spokeswoman for the Diocese of San Jose, said Thursday. “He would appreciate prayers at this time.”
The diocese did not provide further details about how the 73- year- old bishop was injured.
News of McGrath’s accident came as Catholics celebrate All Saints Day on Nov. 1, a holy day of obligation.
McGrath took over as the San Jose diocese’s second bishop in 1999 when Bishop Pierre DuMaine retired. McGrath has led the diocese through challenges and profound demographic shifts. The workload of managing those challenges was so great that an auxiliary bishop, Thomas Daly, was appointed in 2011 to help McGrath.
The church requires bishops to retire at age 75, and they are to notify the Vatican as they approach that age so a “coadjutor bishop” who will become the successor can be appointed to begin the transition.
After Daly left in 2015 to become bishop of Spokane, Washington, McGrath asked the Holy See for permission to retire early but has yet to announce a retirement date.
The Vatican in July announced that Las Cruces Bishop Oscar Cantú will become coadjutor bishop in San Jose. Cantú, 51, was formally welcomed Sept. 28.
McGrath has been outspoken in defense of immigrant rights, wading into a divisive national debate on illegal immigration by holding a prayer service in July for immigration reform and reunification of migrant families separated at the U. S.-Mexico border.
McGrath also has confronted a number of controversies in recent months. A state investigation into Pennsylvania dioceses that in August revealed widespread clergy sex abuse and cover- ups dating back decades renewed focus worldwide on the church scandal.
It prompted McGrath to
hold a series of “listening sessions” at churches throughout the diocese to hear parishioners’ concerns about the San Jose diocese’s handling of local allegations. McGrath also named 15 priests accused of sex abuse in the diocese and announced an internal investigation of the diocese’s response to the abuse cases led by a former FBI official.
On a more personal level, McGrath angered many of his own parishioners when they learned in August that the diocese had bought a $2.3 million, five-bedroom home in San Jose’s desir- able Willow Glen neighborhood for his retirement. McGrath later announced that “I erred in judgment” on the house and said the diocese would sell it, donate any profit to charity and that he would instead live out his retirement in amore modest parish rectory.