At 3:02 p.m. June 22, Father Kevin Kenney laid down for a nap before attending a Minnesota United soccer match that night with some friends. Then his phone started ringing; it was a number with a 202 area code. Intuitively, Father Kenney knew what awaited him.
On the line was Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the apostolic nuncio to the United States. The cardinal let Father Kenney know Pope Francis had appointed him as an auxiliary bishop to the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.
“I was speechless,” Bishop-elect Kevin Kenney told “Practicing Catholic” radio show host Patrick Conley during an interview debuting at 9 p.m. Aug. 23 on Relevant Radio 1330 AM. “He’s like, ‘Hello? Are you still there?’ And I said, ‘Yes, of course I’m still here. I don’t know what to say’ and he said, ‘Just say yes and pray about it later.’”
Despite Cardinal Pierre’s suggestion, Bishop-elect Kevin Kenney said he couldn’t do that. He decided to take this all in, reflect on it and bring it to prayer. The hardest part for Bishop-elect Kenney was knowing he couldn’t talk to anybody about it. When Cardinal Pierre called again the morning of June 25, Bishop-elect Kenney called him back in the afternoon to say he wasn’t ready to decide yet.
“My head is saying ‘no,’ my heart is saying ‘yes’ and I just have to somehow reconcile that,” Bishop-elect Kenney said he told the cardinal. After a few more days of prayer and a meeting with Archbishop Bernard Hebda, Bishop-elect Kenney said, “I was able to discern that yes, this is something I could do and wanted to do. The Lord put that in me — and in my heart and my head (I) could say yes.”
Asked about his discernment process, Bishop-elect Kenney said prayer was the focus. He also listened closely to the daily Mass readings during that time. In many of the readings, the focus was on the prophets being uncertain about God’s call.
“I mean the readings during that time were very poignant in the sense of the prophets saying, ‘Lord, I don’t want to do this. Lord, why are you putting me through this? But then they’re coming around to saying, ‘OK, Lord. I trust in your grace.’ The biggest thing that kept coming back to me, from the Lord, is ‘My grace is enough.’”
One of the bishop-elect’s biggest concerns was that he would be taken away from “the people.” Bishop-elect Kenney explained that he loves being a pastor and being out amongst the people. But Cardinal Pierre reassured him, saying that that is what Pope Francis wants from bishops, that they be out with their people.
“I kept saying, ‘I’m not bishop material,’ in my own head,” Bishop-elect Kenney said. “And he (Archbishop Hebda) says, ‘Well, you’re called because of who you are. You’re not called to be somebody different in this. Just be who you are and who you are is why you’re called.’” Bishop-elect Kenney said those words “kept coming back to me,” allowing him to say, “OK, I must have the gifts and the Lord’s going to provide.”
To hear more about Bishop-elect Kenney’s journey to becoming a bishop, tune into “Practicing Catholic,” which repeats at 1 p.m. Aug. 24 and 2 p.m. Aug. 25.????
The program also includes an interview with the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis’ coordinator of restorative practices and survivor support, Paula Kaempffer, on ways to support victims of clergy abuse. Also, Father Anthony Skaria dives into the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church and the new Syro-Malabar parish at the former St. Vincent de Paul campus in St. Paul.???
Produced by Relevant Radio and the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, the program can also be heard after it has aired at archspm.org/faith-and-discipleship/practicing-catholic or choose a streaming platform at Spotify for Podcasters.?
