Watch 11 News reporter Vicente Arenas' update
Catholics across Texas, Houston in particular, were celebrating Wednesday the appointment of the state's first cardinal. Pope Benedict elevated Daniel DiNardo, the archbishop of the Galveston-Houston Arch Diocese to one of the highest-ranking positions within the Catholic Church.
Long before the mass started at Holy Family Church in Missouri City, Tereza Jalomo was on the phone, calling friends.
“Because I was so excited to find out that our diocese was not only have an arch but designated to be a cardinal,” said Jalomo. “I feel like we are going to receive many blessings from this.”
Archbishop Daniel DiNardo's elevation to cardinal status now gives the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston a vote in Rome. One of the most important would be the selection of a new pope if needed.
The news of DiNardo’s appointment left parishioners stunned.
Click to read the list of sitting Cardinals
“It was a great honor,” said Holy Family Parishioner Mary Guajardo. “It was a feeling I could not explain. But it was a great honor.”
Cardinal designee DiNardo says the Pope recognizes the growth of the Catholic and Hispanic population in Houston and that's one of the reason he believes he was chosen.
“It’s a major growing area of Catholics in the United States,” said DiNardo. “It’s (the same in the) south, southwest and southeast.”
Houston has a few other non-Catholic, internationally known pastors including Joel Osteen, or his Hispanic counter part Marcos Witt of Lakewood Church and Dr. Ed Young of the Second Baptist Church.
They have huge followings.
Some religious scholars say a cardinal here will raise the church to new levels.
“We too should be enthusiastic about our religion,” said Fr. Daniel Callum of the University of St. Thomas. “And as they (Osteen, Young etc.) have a prominence in the nation because of their leaders, so we too have that. “I think it will sort of give us a boost to the religious tone of this city.”
That tone crosses denomination lines, as was evident Wednesday night. Just hours after Archbishop DiNardo made his announcement, he was at a protestant church helping install a new minister.
Many there would tell you there's something about a cardinal's presence that gives a ceremony a whole new feel.
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