ROME — Pope Leo XIV on Wednesday named an eventual successor to embattled New Orleans Archbishop Gregory M. Aymond, two weeks after the archdiocese agreed to a $230 million proposed settlement for survivors of clergy sexual abuse.
Leo, history’s first U.S. pope, named Bishop James Checchio of Metuchen, New Jersey, as the coadjutor bishop of New Orleans. The position puts Checchio in line to succeed Aymond when he retires.
Checchio, 59, handled the fallout in Metuchen of the explosive 2018 sexual misconduct revelations of one of his predecessors there, then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. Prior to arriving in Metuchen in 2016, Checchio had served as the rector of the U.S. seminary in Rome for a decade.
Aymond reached the mandatory retirement age of 75 last November, suggesting that the Vatican kept him in place to finalize the abuse settlement and allow for an organized handover to his successor.
The New Orleans archdiocese agreed Sept. 8 to a $230 million proposed settlement to end one of the U.S. church’s longest and most contentious battles over abuse claims. It had proposed in May to pay at least $179.2 million in response to more than 500 abuse claims, but victims’ attorneys opposed the deal as too low.
Survivors have until late October to vote on whether or not to approve the revised settlement. If approved by two-thirds of survivors, payments could begin disbursement by next year.
The archdiocese had filed for bankruptcy in May 2020, rather than handle each abuse claim separately, which survivors say allowed church leadership to avoid facing tough questions in court.
Aymond had resisted calls for his resignation over the church’s failures, which triggered a sweeping FBI probe and a cascading crisis for the Catholic Church. An AP investigation earlier this year revealed that the archdiocese had sought help from New Orleans Saints executives to help behind the scenes with damage control.
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