Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio, the seventh Bishop of Brooklyn, is a forceful voice on behalf of migrants and immigrants, whose causes he has worked for through most of his priestly ministry. By appointing the Bishop to serve as the spiritual leader of the Diocese of Brooklyn, Pope John Paul II recognized both Brooklyn’s popular status as a Diocese of Immigrants, as well as the Bishop’s skill in responding to the needs of newcomers from other lands. Read more »
The Most Reverend Raymond Chappetto, D.D., V.G., was born August 20, 1945, in Astoria. He studied at Our Lady of Angels Seminary, Albany, where he holds a Master’s of Divinity, as well as a Master’s of Arts in Religious Education from St. John’s University. He is also certified in Pastoral Counseling. Read more »
Auxiliary Bishop Octavio Cisneros was born in Las Villas, a province of Cuba, on July 19, 1945, the third of four children of Roberto Cisneros and Olga Lezcano, both now deceased. Shortly after his birth, his family moved to La Habana, where he was baptized in Our Lady Montserrat Church.
The Piarist Fathers educated him as a youngster, and in October 1961, while a high school student, he came to the United States as a political refugee as part of Operation Peter Pan, a Catholic humanitarian effort that brought 14,000 unaccompanied minors to the U.S. from Cuba. Read more »
The Very Reverend James Massa was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, to the late Andrew and Irene Gilbert Massa. He attended Boston College and graduated with a Bachelor’s in Theology and History in 1982. In 1985, he earned a Master’s of Divinity Degree from Yale University, and in 1997, a Ph.D. in Systematic Theology from Fordham University, where he wrote his dissertation under the late Cardinal Avery Dulles. Read More
The Reverend Canon Witold Mroziewski was born on March 25, 1966, to Waclawa Jablonska and the late Jan Edmund Mroziewski in Augustow, Poland. He earned a Masters in Theology from the Catholic University in Lublin, Poland, in 1991. He returned to K.U.L., Poland, and earned a Masters in Canon Law (2001) and Juris Canon Lawyer (Doctoral 2003). Read More
The Most Reverend Paul Sanchez was born November 26, 1946, in Brooklyn. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from St. Bonaventure’s University, a Master of Arts from the University of Notre Dame and a Licentiate of Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. Read more »
Born in Jeremie, Haiti, Oct. 6, 1934, into a devout Catholic family, Auxiliary Bishop Guy A. Sansaricq decided at age 13 that he wanted to become a priest. He attended the seminary of the Jeremie Diocese for five years, after which he received a scholarship to St. Paul’s Pontifical Seminary in Ottawa, Canada, where he studied philosophy and theology for seven years. In 1960 he was ordained a priest in the cathedral in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Read more »
The Most Reverend Neil Tiedemann, born March 5, 1948, at Peck Memorial Hospital in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, was raised in St. Catherine of Sienna Parish in Franklin Square, Long Island. He attended the Passionists’ Holy Cross H.S. Seminary in Dunkirk, NY; Holy Family Seminary in West Hartford CT; LaSalle University in Philadelphia, PA in 1970 received a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology; and earned master degrees in Theology and Masters in Divinity in 1975 at St. John’s University in Jamaica, Queens. Read more »
The youngest of three sons of Venezuelan parents — Caesar and the late Maria (Cordova) Valero, both born in Caracas — he has also influenced the development of Hispanic ministry in the Diocese since the mid-1970s.
Born in the West Harlem section of Manhattan on Aug. 15, 1930, he attended St. Joseph’s School there and Sacred Heart Mission House, Girard, Pa., before beginning seminary training at Cathedral College, Brooklyn. Read more »
