Denver's Catholic archdiocese, famously conservative, enters the Leo era

(RNS) — When the helicopter delivering Pope John Paul II to a Catholic youth festival descended into Denver’s Mile High Stadium 32 years ago, the crowd’s roar, the pilot later told papal biographer George Weigel, created turbulence he hadn’t experienced since being under fire in the Vietnam War.

Denver was a curious choice to host World Youth Day. A handful of U.S. cities have deeper ties to the Catholic Church, while Denver was seen as not only not historically Catholic, but also not particularly religious. Its then-Archbishop (later Cardinal) J. Francis Stafford was committed nonetheless to bringing a wave of evangelization to Denver.

Under Stafford and his successors, Archbishops Charles Chaput and Samuel Aquila, Denver became a hub for influential conservative Catholic evangelizing ministries such as the Fellowship of Catholic University Students and the Augustine Institute. When the Pillar, an outlet focused on Catholicism’s inside baseball, launched in 2021 with a controversial investigation into Catholic priests’ use of a gay dating app, it was with the help of millions from Denver Catholic donors. The three archbishops that fostered this milieu are seen, depending on a given Catholic point of view, as defenders of church orthodoxy or else combative culture warriors.

But as Pope Leo XIV is intent on pursuing unity and a lower temperature, many U.S. dioceses are still led by bishops placed by Pope Benedict XVI, nicknamed “God’s Rottweiler.” Leo’s February pick for Denver, Bishop James Golka, who was installed March 25, may illustrate how he plans to approach the church’s polarization.

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