Building the City of God

“Building the City of God” is a series of priest profiles published regularly in the Miami edition of The Florida Catholic (the first one appeared in March, 2003).

The series seeks to reveal “the man behind the collar” by giving a quick glimpse of the personal side of priests’ lives.“Building the City of God” has won a Communicator Award of Distinction in the Marketing/Promotion/Campaign category for print media.

The Award of Distinction is given to projects that exceed industry standards in communicating a message or idea.

Fr. Mannix Stack		Fr. Alvaro Pinzón		Archbishop Thomas Wenski
Born Aug. 11, 1920, in Cobh, County Cork, Ireland, Father Stack was a Presentation Brother for 35 years, beginning in 1939. He taught in, established and administered Catholic high schools in Ireland, Grenada, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, and St. Lucia. Read More..		Born Dec. 13, 1965 in Rondón, Boyacá, Colombia, Father Pinzón entered the seminary after high school and was ordained for the Diocese of Garagoa, Boyacá, Colombia, on Nov. 30, 1991. Read More..		Born Oct. 18, 1950, in West Palm Beach, Archbishop Wenski is the son of first- and second-generation Polish immigrants. He attended Sacred Heart School in Lake Worth and in ninth grade entered what was then the high school seminary of St. John Vianney. Read More..

Archbishop John C. Favalora		Fr. Fernando Heria		Fr. Jean Pierre
Born Dec. 5, 1935, in New Orleans, Archbishop Favalora is the only child of an Italian grocer and a Cajun homemaker. He attended the all-boys Jesuit High School in New Orleans and entered the seminary in the New Orleans area after graduation. Read More..		Born Oct. 13, 1950 in Cuba, he came to the U.S. with his family at age 11, graduated from Hialeah High School and served in the U.S. Army. He entered the seminary at age 40, after 13 years as a criminal defense attorney, and was ordained for the Archdiocese of Miami in 1996. Read More..		Born in Haiti in 1954, he speaks fluent English and Spanish. In May, 1988, he became the first Haitian priest to be ordained for the archdiocese. Read More..

Fr. Jaime Acevedo		Fr. James P. Murphy		Fr. Fernando Isern
Born Jan. 6, 1953, in Santurce, Puerto Rico, Father Acevedo attended school there but studied for the priesthood at St. John Vianney Seminary in Miami and St. Vincent de Paul Seminary in Boynton Beach. Read More..		Born June 24, 1945, in Cork, Ireland, Father Murphy is one of seven children. He entered St. John’s Seminary in Waterford, Ireland, right after high school as a “freelance seminarian,” unattached to a diocese. He chose Miami because“ it was a new diocese. Read More..		Born Sept. 22, 1958, in Havana, Father Isern moved to Venezuela with his family at the age of 5. When he was 9, they moved to Miami where he attended public elementary school and a private high school, Champagnat. (He still celebrates the school's graduation Mass each year.) Read More..

Fr. Paul Vuturo		Father-Alfred-Cioffi		Fr. Reginald Jean-Mary
Born Aug. 14, 1947, in Indianapolis, he moved to Miami with his family “in 1955 BC — before Cubans,” as he puts it. After graduating from St. Rose of Lima in Miami Shores, Read More..		The son of a Cuban mother and Italian father, Father Alfred Cioffi was born in Havana, Cuba, Nov. 5, 1952, the older of two brothers. The family left Cuba in 1960 and lived in New Orleans and New York before moving to various countries in Central America. (His father worked for the airline Alitalia.) Read More..		Born Oct. 18, 1967, in Jean-Rabel, Haiti, Father Jean-Mary is the fifth of seven brothers and sisters. His father was a farmer who wanted him to study agronomy, but he was interested in law as a way of fighting the injustice he witnessed in Haiti. Read More..

Fr. George Puthusseril		Fr. Eduardo Jiménez		Fr. Michael Davis
Born in 1955 in the state of Kerala, India, Father Puthusseril was ordained for the Diocese of Krishnagar, India, on Oct. 6, 1979. While studying for his canon law degree in Rome, he made friends with some priests from the northern United States, whom he visited a few summers. Read More..		He was ordained for the Salesian congregation Jan. 24, 1982, in the parish of San Juan Bosco, Havana, and named director of the marriage ministry for the Diocese of Cienfuegos-Santa Clara. He obtained a licentiate in theology from the Pontifical Salesian University in Rome in December 1987. Read More..		The oldest of three children, Father Davis was born in Hamilton, Ohio, Sept. 16, 1963. He entered the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio, in 1981, studying for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. A summer doing evangelization work in Mexico proved Read More..

Fr. Roberto Garza		Fr. Pedro Corces		Fr. Jesús Bohorquez
Born Oct. 2, 1967, in Tulia, Texas, Father Garza is the oldest of four children. His great-greatgrandparents were cattle ranchers from southern Spain who settled in that area of the U.S. when it was part of Mexico. Read More..		Born in Cuba in 1957, Father Corces grew up in Miami and was ordained for the archdiocese in 1988. As vocations director, he is responsible for recruiting and screening candidates to the priesthood. He also helps out at Prince of Peace Church in Miami, teaches lay ministry courses and has been involved with the HIV/AIDS ministry. Read More..		The son of Colombian parents, Father Bohórquez was born in Argentina on Oct. 25, 1972. He lived in Venezuela and Colombia before coming to the United States in 1988. He graduated from McArthur High School in Hollywood in 1990, and entered St. John Vianney College Seminary in Miami six years later. Read More..

Fr. Paul Edwards †		Fr. Roger Holoubek		Fr. José Espino
Born in Illinois in 1954, he grew up in Hialeah, entered the seminary at 15 and was ordained for the Archdiocese of Miami in 1983. He is founding pastor of two-year-old Read More..		Born May 10, 1943 in Butte, Mont.,Father Holoubek moved to Clewiston, Fla.,with his parents and sister when he wasfour months old. He attended local publicschools, then studied one year at theUniversity of Florida before entering theseminary. Read More..		Born April 6, 1956 in Guantánamo, Cuba, Father Espino is the third of six brothers and sisters. He came to Miami in 1961 with a sister and older brother (now deceased) as part of the Pedro Pan program, which ultimately spirited more than 14,000 children out of Cuba. Read More..

Fr. Jordi Rivero		Fr. Jose Alvarez		Msgr. James Reynolds
Born June 1, 1951, in Havana, Father Rivero left there with his family at age 9, moving to his great-grandmother's house in Barcelona, Spain. Three years later, the family moved to his grandfather's cattle ranch in central Florida, where he learned to drive a tractor and prepare the land for pasture. Read More..		Born Nov. 11, 1960, in Havana, Cuba, Father Alvarez came to Miami with his parents and older sister in 1967. He grew up in St. John Bosco Parish, Little Havana, and entered the seminary at age 36. He was ordained for the Archdiocese of Miami on May 10, 2003. Read More..		The Brooklyn-born son of first-generation Irish immigrants, Msgr. Reynolds is marking his 80th birthday (Jan. 18, 1925), his 55th year in the priesthood (ordained June 3, 1950 for the Archdiocese of Brooklyn) and his 25th year as pastor of St. Henry, a parish of 1,300, as he puts it, “chronologically-gifted” families. Read More..

Fr. Robés Charles		Msgr. Tomás Marín		† Msgr. Patrick McDonnell
Born Feb. 14, 1961, in Limbé, Haiti, Father Charles studied to become an electrician and interior designer after graduating from high school in his homeland. But he always felt called to the priesthood. Read More..		Born Oct. 31, 1956, in Santa Clara, Cuba, Msgr. Marin came to the United States with his family - parents and younger sister - at age 4. They settled in Chicago. Read More..		Born Oct. 10, 1933, in Ennis, County Clare, Ireland, Msgr. McDonnell is the eldest of five children. He was ordained June 16, 1957, for the then-Miami Diocese. Among his many assignments during the past 47 years, Read More..

Fr. Luis García		Fr. Juan Carlos Paguaga		Msgr. Noel Fogarty
Born Jan. 21, 1953, in Havana, Cuba, Father García is an only child. He started elementary school in Cuba but completed it in Spain, where he had emigrated with his parents. Read More..		Born June 22, 1969, in León, Nicaragua, Father Paguaga is the oldest of four children. He arrived in the United States Dec. 1, 1989, after a one-month, $2,000 journey from Guatemala. Read More..		Born Dec. 30, 1928, in Galway, Ireland, Msgr. Fogarty is the second youngest of seven children. He attended seminaries in Ireland, was ordained June 2, 1957, and was recruited for the Diocese of St. Augustine, Read More..

Fr. Michael Hoyer		Fr. Michael Carruthers		Fr. Federico Capdepon
Born May 27, 1955 in Suffern, N.Y., Father Hoyer has four brothers and two sisters. His father is 95 years old; his mother died three years ago at 88. His family operates an ice cream store in upstate New York that has remained in business at the same location for 53 years. Read More..		Born May 6, 1964, in Levittown, New York, his family moved to Jensen Beach when he was 8. He attended public schools and St. Martin de Porres Parish, and was studying at Indian River Community College when he decided to enter the seminary. Read More..		Born April 12, 1951 in Miranda, a city in Burgos, Spain, he came to Miami in 1978 on a business venture: representing 40 Spanish publishers seeking to sell bilingual textbooks in the U.S. market. Read More..

Fr. Terence Hogan		Fr. James Fetscher		Fr. Robert Tywoniak
Born Oct. 6, 1952, in Washington, D.C., Father Hogan is the second of three children. His family moved to Florida in 1965 and became active in Holy Rosary Parish in Perrine. He entered St. John Vianney Seminary as a ninth-grader in 1966 and was ordained a priest for the Miami Archdiocese in 1980. Read More..		Born Aug. 9, 1941 in Jamaica Plain, N.Y., he moved to Miami in 1949 and grew up in Holy Family Parish, North Miami. He attended Archbishop Curley High School and entered the seminary during his senior year. Read More..		Born April 8, 1957 in New Jersey, he moved to Florida with his family around 1970, settling in St. Vincent Parish in Margate, where his parents still live. He was ordained in 1983 and served for 10 years as director of Catholic Charities' child welfare division. Read More..

Fr. Jeffrey McCormick		Fr. Francisco Hernandez		† Fr. Jorge Sardiñas
Born Dec. 5, 1962, in North Miami, Father McCormick is the fifth of eight children born to a Quaker mom and Presbyterian dad who converted to Catholicism in 1966. “They said they converted because they were tired of being called sex maniacs in the Protestant church. Read More..		Born Dec. 22, 1966, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Father Hernandez considers himself a "Cuban-Rican" because he grew up on the island but his parents and grandparents are from Cuba. Read More..		Born Oct. 2, 1950, in Havana, Cuba, he came to the United States in 1960 and attended Corpus Christi and St. John Bosco parishes in Miami. Ordained May 14, 1977, he served at St. Mary Cathedral, worked with farmworkers Read More..

Fr. Joseph Kottayil
Born April 1, 1959, in Kerala, the most Catholic state of India, he is the fifth of seven children. Ordained Dec. 23, 1979, he came to the United States in 1990 and worked at St. Agnes Parish in downtown Brooklyn, Read More..