Pope Leo XIV has appointed Father Emilio Biosca Agüero, a Capuchin Franciscan missionary who served in Cuba and Papua New Guinea, as the new bishop of Venice, Florida.
The Vatican announced the appointment on May 13 alongside the acceptance of the resignation of Bishop Frank J. Dewane, 76, who had led the southwest Florida diocese since 2006. Under canon law, diocesan bishops are required to submit their resignation to the pope upon turning 75.
Bishop-designate Biosca, 61, is a member of the Pittsburgh-based Capuchin Franciscan Friars of the Province of St. Augustine and has served since 2019 as pastor of the Shrine of the Sacred Heart in Washington.
His episcopal ordination and installation as Venice's third bishop will take place July 11. He will be the new shepherd of a diocese that covers 10 counties and has a Catholic population of over 250,000.
At a morning news conference, Bishop Dewane welcomed his successor "to our Diocesan family, which will be greatly blessed by his ministry, and I very much look forward to getting to know him as in just a few days he has shown himself to be a deeply spiritual and exceptional priest."
The son of an immigrant family with seven children, Bishop-designate Biosca "is enthusiastic, with a strong pastoral spirit and particular devotion to the Virgin Mary and to serving the People of God," Bishop Dewane said in a statement.
"Our new Bishop is coming to a Diocese that is growing at a rapid pace with families and individuals that evidence a vibrant faith and diverse backgrounds," he said. "It has been a great joy for me to have ministered here for the past twenty years. I am pleased and very proud of the Catholic Community of the Diocese, who they are and who they are becoming, by their witness to Christ. This has become possible by the great pastoral care and service that the priests, both Diocesan and Religious, have provided."
Bishop Dewane thanked the priests, deacons, religious "and joy-filled laity" of the diocese for "being a wonderful family of faith, hope, and love. I look forward to my continued home here assisting the new Bishop pastorally, in any manner I can. I also look forward to more time for prayer, study and travel."
"I am thrilled to be here and filled with joy to begin this new chapter together in faith and charity," Bishop-designate Biosca said in a statement at the news conference, speaking in English and Spanish. "I am also eager to join you in the great task of evangelization, growing together in our knowledge of Christ and sharing the profound hope of the Gospel"
He expressed gratitude to many, including Pope Leo, Bishop Dewane, his provincial minister and other Capuchin Franciscans, Cardinal Robert W. McElroy of Washington and the Washington Archdiocese. He said he looked forward to meeting the priests of the diocese and thanked its religious and lay faithful, including lay leaders, for their "witness" and "fidelity" to the Church.
"I look forward to entering into the life of this local Church: to know its people, to understand its history, to appreciate its customs and traditions, and to learn the events that have shaped the spiritual character of this region," Bishop-designate Biosca said. "I hope to discover not only the history written in books and archives, but also the living history preserved in families, parishes, neighborhoods and their witness to Christ."
Bishop-designate Biosca has extensive missionary experience, serving 12 years as a missionary in Papua New Guinea before a series of assignments in Cuba from 2007 to 2019 that took him from the Capuchin Fraternity of Cristo de Limpias in Havana, to a parish in Santa Clara, and finally to Iglesia La Purísima Concepción in Manzanillo, where he served for eight years.
The appointment will make him the second Capuchin Franciscan bishop actively serving in the U.S., along with Auxiliary Bishop Matthew G. Elshoff of Los Angeles. Cardinal Seán P. O'Malley, the archbishop emeritus of Boston, who retired in 2024, and Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, archbishop emeritus of Philadelphia, are also both members of the order.
"Bishop-designate Biosca is one of the finest pastors in the Archdiocese of Washington," Cardinal Robert W. McElroy of Washington said in a statement May 13. "He has the faith and witness which attracts men and women to the person of Jesus Christ. He piercingly preaches the Gospel in its integrity and makes the call to conversion real and engaging."
Cardinal McElroy said the newly named bishop "has the tender heart of a true Shepherd, and has made the Shrine of the Sacred Heart a true haven of compassion." He described the bishop-designate as "a skilled administrative leader and a defender of his flock" who has been "unswerving in reaching out to the poor and the marginalized, and the undocumented."
"He is also a bridgebuilder who reaches across the boundaries of polarization to forge real solidarity in the family of God," the cardinal said, adding that St. Francis "burns" in Bishop-designate Biosca's heart. "While I will miss him profoundly in Washington, I know clearly that God is at work in his new mission in Florida, and I give thanks," he said.
As the pastor of the Shrine of the Sacred Heart, Bishop-designate Biosca took a leading role in a procession last fall to mark the 111th World Day of Migrants and Refugees, reflecting on how his parish has always kept its doors open to migrant families. "It doesn't matter where they come from, or what language they speak, we know they are brothers and we welcome them in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ," he said.
Born in Fairfax, Virginia on Dec. 15, 1964, Bishop-designate Biosca entered the Capuchin Franciscans in 1987, the same year that he graduated from Borromeo College in Wickliffe, Ohio, with a degree in philosophy. He made his perpetual profession on Aug. 17, 1991, and was ordained to the priesthood on May 21, 1994.
His theological formation includes a master's degree in theology and a master of divinity, both from Oblate College in Washington, as well as a licentiate in sacred theology from the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family, also in Washington.
From the moment of his ordination, he served as a missionary, spending more than a decade in Papua New Guinea from 1994 to 2006. Bishop-designate Biosca speaks Spanish and Tok Pisin, a Creole language spoken throughout Papua New Guinea.
The Diocese of Venice was established by St. John Paul II in 1984 and encompasses 9,035 square miles in southwest Florida, an area with a significant Cuban American population.
"Jesus reminds us that faith is not simply about knowing ideas about God, but about living in relationship with Him through love," Bishop-designate Biosca wrote in his most recent parish bulletin. "The more we love as Christ loved, the more clearly, we come to recognize His presence in our lives."
