Honolulu’s retiring, incoming Catholic bishops reflect on the church’s past and future in Hawaii

News admin July 24, 2026 0 Comments

Honolulu’s retiring, incoming Catholic bishops reflect on the church’s past and future in Hawaii

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – It has been 21 years since the Catholic Diocese of Honolulu has welcomed a new shepherd. But a ceremony is scheduled Tuesday at the Co-Cathedral of St. Theresa to install the 12th leader for Hawaii’s 250,000 Catholics.

The Most Rev. Larry Silva reached the mandatory retirement age of 75 for bishops last year. He easily recalls one of the high points of his tenure.

“I was very privileged to be the bishop when two saints were canonized here in Hawaii, Saint Damien and Saint Marianna,” he said. “I don’t think too many bishops can say that.”

But sex abuse scandals that rocked the Catholic Church also included clergy members in Hawaii in cases dating back to the 1950s, with the church paying millions of dollars to victims.

“The most painful things that I’ve had to deal with as a bishop is the great sorrow and shock and shame of priests and others who have abused, especially, minors,” said Silva.

The diocese instituted new safeguards so that any new employee, priest or deacon has to be vetted and go through a training program.

Silva’s successor, Father Michael Castori, who grew up in California, said the church has also made other major changes.

“If there’s any kind of accusation of abuse to minors, any illegality, law enforcement are immediately brought into the process of investigation,” said Castori.

Father Castori has done missionary work around the Pacific.

“It’s been 40 years since I first landed in Hawaii on my way to work in Guam and then the Marshall Islands and Fiji and Tonga,” he said.

Tonga is where he got one of his middle names, Tupou. He explained that he was welcomed into a local family.

“At this home, the father there, Malatino Tupou, he stood up, he said, ‘til now I’ve had eleven children, and now I have 12, like the apostles.’ And I became a Tupou at that point,” Castori said.

Castori also will inherit issues, such as the future of Kalaupapa, where recently, Molokai residents protested hiking tours to the peninsula.

“We are trying to negotiate with the Department of Land and Natural Resources, the Health Department, Maui County now,” said Silva. “The National Park Service is (also) a player.

“Everybody’s trying to do the right thing, but we all need to get together and talk about the future and how we can make pilgrimages possible and responsible,” he added.

Silva also began the process of renovating the Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of Peace, with work set to be complete in the fall of 2027, which also marks the 200th anniversary of Catholicism in Hawaii.

Silva also said church attendance increased in Hawaii in the past few years, first under Pope Francis and now under American-born Pope Leo XIV.

“People, I think, are feeling the emptiness of nearly artificial and virtual modes of relating to each other,” said Castori.

The ceremonies to install Castori as bishop will begin at 10 a.m. Tuesday. Church officials stress that traffic is expected to be heavy on North School Street during that time. Space will also be extremely limited inside the Co-Cathedral of St. Theresa. The ceremonies will also be livestreamed at www.catholichawaii.org/livestream.

Meantime, Silva will remain in Hawaii as Bishop Emeritus.

“I will sleep more. I will exercise more, I think,” he said. “But I will also make myself available to Bishop Michael.”