Bishop Salvatore Matano, who has overseen the Diocese of Burlington since 2005, was named bishop of the diocese of Rochester, N.Y.
Church officials in Rochester announced Wednesday that Pope Francis has named Bishop Salvatore R. Matano the ninth bishop of the Rochester diocese, which covers a 12-county region in central and western New York. The 67-year-old Matano is currently the bishop of the Diocese of Burlington, which comprises the entire state of Vermont. Before being named Burlington bishop in 2005, the Providence, R.I., native held church posts in Washington, D.C. and his hometown.
Matano said he hadn't sought the appointment, and he'd planned to stay in Burlington "until my duties will have reached completion."
The bishop's tenure in Vermont was marked by the priest abuse scandal that rocked the Catholic Church in recent years. The Burlington diocese paid out millions to settle cases and had to sell the property where its Burlington headquarters is located.
"I pray I handled those circumstances as best I could," Matano said Wednesday. "But every day I beg God's mercy for the inadequacies that may have been in place when I dealt with these circumstances."
The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) said in a statement that Matano hadn't handled the crisis well, calling him "a bureaucrat with a terrible record on children's safety."
The Rochester diocese, where Matano will start Jan. 3, has about 300,000 worshippers from Rochester to the Pennsylvania border, according to the AP report.
It is not known when the Vatican will name a new Bishop to the Burlington Diocese.
