Pope Accepts Resignation of Bishop Robert Brom of San Diego

Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Bishop Robert H. Brom, 75, from the pastoral governance of the Diocese of San Diego, and named Co-Adjutor Bishop Cirilo B. Flores, 65, to assume pastoral governance of the diocese.

The resignation and appointment were publicized in Washington, September 18, by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, apostolic nuncio to the United States.

Cirilo Flores was born June 20, 1948, in Corona, California. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Loyola Marymount University, Los Angles; a doctorate from Stanford University Law School, Palo Alto, California; and a master of divinity degree from St. John Seminary, in Camarillo, California. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Orange, California in 1991, and bishop of Orange in 2009.

Bishop Brom has served as bishop of San Diego since 1990. He was ordained a priest for the diocese of Winona, Minnesota, in 1963, and appointed bishop of Duluth, Minnesota, in 1983. He was named co-adjutor bishop of San Diego in 1989.

The San Diego diocese covers 8,852 square miles in the state of California and has a total population of 3,127,045 people, with 986,499, or 32 percent of them, Catholic.