Joseph Strickland is Still a Bishop

Mid-November brought more dispiriting signs of the state of the Catholic Church in the United States. On November 11 came the firing of conservative bishop Joseph Strickland as head of the Tyler, Texas, diocese. It was understandably welcomed by those fed up with Strickland’s MAGA-aligned grandstanding and increasingly extremist attacks on Pope Francis for “undermining the Deposit of the Faith.” Uncertain is the degree to which mismanagement of the diocese might also have been a factor. Regardless, the move isn’t likely to remove Strickland from the scene.