• Social Media Best Practices
  • Family Guide for Using Media
  • Your Family in Cyberspace
  • Communications Directory
  • Programming Protocol
  • Pastoral Plan
  • Media Bias
  • Media Seminars
  • Renewing the Mind of the Media
  • Introduction
  • Digital Television
  • Indecency
  • E-Rate
  • Copyrights
  • Low Power FM
  • Media Ownership
  • Media Violence
  • Parental Notification
  • Fairness Doctrine
  • Current
  • Archived

Pope Accepts Resignation Of Lansing Bishop Mengeling, Names Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Earl Boyea To Succeed Him

WASHINGTON—Pope Benedict XVI has accepted the resignation of Bishop Carl F. Mengeling, 77, as bishop of Lansing, Michigan, and named Bishop Earl A. Boyea, 56, auxiliary bishop of Detroit, to succeed him.

The resignation acceptance and the appointment were announced in Washington, February 27, by Archbishop Pietro Sambi, apostolic nuncio to the United States.

Earl Boyea was born in Pontiac, Michigan, on April 10, 1951.

He studied at Sacred Heart Seminary in Detroit and at the North American College in Rome, where he earned a licentiate in Sacred Theology at the Gregorian University. He was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Detroit, May 20, 1978. In 2000, he was made a domestic prelate and on July 22, 2002, Pope John Paul II named him an auxiliary bishop of Detroit.

While serving as an associate pastor, he earned a master of arts degree in history at Wayne State University in Detroit in 1984. He earned a doctorate in church history from The Catholic University of America, Washington, in 1987, and also did graduate studies at the University of Michigan.

For 12 years, from 1988 to 2000, he served on the faculty of Sacred Heart Seminary. In February, 2000, Msgr. Boyea was named President/Rector of the Pontifical College Josephinum, a position he held until 2002.

During his years on the Sacred Heart Seminary faculty, he published a number of articles in the Catholic Historical Review.

Bishop Boyea is a member of the Catholic Biblical Association, American Catholic Historical Association, U.S. Catholic Historical Society, Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, Midwest Association of Theological Schools, and the National Catholic Educational Association.

As a member of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Bishop Boyea served on the Committee on Boundaries of Dioceses and Provinces, Committee on Priestly Formation and Committee on Selection of Bishops.

The Lansing Diocese includes 6,218 square miles. The total population of the diocese is estimated at 1,808,235 people, with 222,519 of them Catholic.