Kevin C. Rhoades
Kevin Carl Rhoades was born on November 26, 1957, in Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania, in the coal country of Schuylkill County The family moved to Lebanon, Pennsylvania, when he was about a year old, and he grew up there as a member of Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Parish, attending St. Mary's School and graduating from Lebanon Catholic High School in 1975. His devout Catholic mother taught him the faith; his Lutheran father supported his children's Catholic education.
Rhoades studied at Mount St. Mary's College, then at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, earning a bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1979, and did his theological studies at the North American College and the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, where he later earned advanced degrees in dogmatic theology and canon law. Ordained a priest of Harrisburg in July 1983, he served in parish and Spanish-speaking ministry in York, Pennsylvania, and as assistant chancellor under Bishop William Keeler. He was consecrated Bishop of Harrisburg on December 9, 2004, and served there until Pope Benedict XVI appointed him the ninth Bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend on November 14, 2009.
Installed on January 13, 2010, in the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Fort Wayne, Rhoades has led a diocese spanning two cities and fourteen counties, with Notre Dame inside its bounds and a strong Hispanic ministry. He chaired the bishops' Committee on Religious Liberty, was elected USCCB Secretary in 2025, and his motto is Veritatem in caritate, truth in charity. A canon lawyer, he governs in decrees and appointments, and that habit shapes his record on the older liturgy: the parishes he erected for it before Traditionis Custodes are the ones he has staffed since.
- 2011-09-27PRE-TC CONTEXT ONLY: Decree making Sacred Heart Parish, Fort Wayne, a personal parish for those worshipping according to the extraordinary form, effective Nov 6, 2011. Cited as context; it cannot move the TC-era posture. ↗
- 2023-01-16Rhoades appoints Fr. Dominic Savoie, FSSP, as Administrator of Sacred Heart Parish, Fort Wayne, the diocese's FSSP personal parish, effective January 16, 2023. ↗
- 2023-06-20Rhoades moves Fr. Dominic Savoie, FSSP, from Parochial Administrator to Pastor of Sacred Heart Parish, Fort Wayne (assignment listed among appointments effective June 20, 2023, per the diocesan statements index; exact effective date of the pastor appointment not separately confirmed). ↗
- 2025-10-04Rhoades confirms thirty candidates at Sacred Heart Parish, Fort Wayne, on October 4, 2025, per the parish bulletin. Witness and pastoral presence at the FSSP parish; recorded as an action feeding the verdict, not as the governing act itself. ↗
- 2025-09-14St. Stanislaus, Bishop and Martyr, South Bend, an FSSP apostolate, publishes its Sunday Mass schedule (7:30 a.m. low Mass, 10:00 a.m. sung Mass) and weekday schedule, showing the second FSSP site operating in the TC era. ↗
<p>Bishop Rhoades's record on the older liturgy is the longest in this batch, and the distinction between its two halves matters. Before Traditionis Custodes he was its architect in his diocese: his decree of September 27, 2011, made Sacred Heart in Fort Wayne a personal parish for those worshipping according to the extraordinary form, effective November 6, 2011, and he later made St. Stanislaus in South Bend a personal parish for the same Latin Mass community. Those are pre-TC acts, and under the rules of this project they are dated context in the dossier, never the posture.</p>
<p>What moves the posture is what he did after July 2021. On January 16, 2023, Rhoades appointed Fr. Dominic Savoie, FSSP, as administrator of Sacred Heart, Fort Wayne, and subsequently moved him from administrator to pastor of that parish. Appointing the priest who sustains a Mass is, by the stated rules of this project, a governing act sustaining the Mass, and it is the act on which the preserved verdict rests. Both FSSP sites were still operating in 2025: Sacred Heart's October 2025 bulletin lists Fr. Savoie as pastor with three Sunday Masses, and St. Stanislaus's September 2025 bulletin lists its Sunday low and sung Masses.</p>
<p>Rhoades's presence at Sacred Heart on October 4, 2025, confirming thirty candidates there, is recorded as witness feeding the verdict, not as its basis. No TC-era decree, restriction, or Roman dispensation by Rhoades was found, and no site was gained or lost: two sites before, two sites now. The confidence is medium rather than high because the TC-era evidence is appointments and continued operation rather than a published TC implementation document, and the exact effective date of Savoie's move to pastor rests on the diocesan statements index rather than a separately dated announcement.</p>