Wenski shakes up south Florida

A mere four months into his new post leading the Miami archdiocese, Archbishop Thomas Wenksi has made some sweeping changes.

"This is a fresh start, a reinvigoration," Wenski told 300 priests convened last week at the Doral Marriott for a 2-1/2 day session to lay out his vision for the archdiocese.

According to the Miami Herald, Wenski has:

• Reassigned 33 priests and deacons, representing more than a quarter of the region's churches, to far-flung churches and other assignments in what he has described as the first part of an ongoing reorganization of ministers.
• Reopened an Allapattah church that shuttered last year during a 10-percent cutback of the archdiocese's churches, and he has raised the possibility that other churches could also reopen.
• Reconfigured his cabinet, including elevating a Haitian-American priest to oversee Roman Catholic canon law in the church -- the highest position a Haitian-American has been given in the archdiocese -- and appointing a nun as the church's chief operating officer, the first woman to have the position in the archdiocese.