Being a ‘bridge’

J.D. Long-Garía/CATHOLIC SUN

Bishop-elect Eduardo A. Nevares celebrates Mass at the downtown Diocesan Pastoral Center May 11, the day his appointment as auxiliary bishop of Phoenix was announced.

How Bishop-elect Nevares’
background will help him serve

When Beatriz Nevares and her five children came to the United States, they crossed a bridge over the Rio Grande.

Beatriz was pregnant with Eduardo Alanis Nevares — the Texas priest who, come July 19, will be the first auxiliary bishop in the history of the Phoenix Diocese. And if you want to know the bishop-elect, you have to understand the bridge his mother crossed.

Bishop-elect Nevares’ father, Andrés, had come to the United States to find work to support his growing family. He got a job in Chicago and sent for his beloved wife and children.

While en route, complications in her pregnancy forced Beatriz to stay in San Antonio, about 150 miles north of the border. A few months later, baby Eduardo was born.

“In the home, there was always a bicultural, bilingual situation,” Bishop-elect Nevares explained. He would speak to his parents in Spanish and to his siblings in English.

The family moved to Houston and eventually to a predominantly Anglo neighborhood. There, Bishop-elect Nevares experienced some racial tensions.

“I’m an American,” he said, “but my parents kept reminding me of my roots. We just kept growing up with the two languages and the two cultures.”

The family would routinely visit relatives in Monterrey, Mexico. But his formal education was always in English. In fact, his teachers quickly began calling him “Edward” rather than “Eduardo.”

It formed Fr. Nevares into a “bridge person,” a term the bishop-elect used to describe himself during a May 11 press conference announcing his appointment.

“Because of his Spanish, he was able to reach out to the Hispanic community,” Terice Richards, Bishop-elect Nevares’ sister, said of his first priestly assignment at St. Patrick Parish in Lufkin, Texas.

After that, Fr. Nevares served as vocations director for the Missionaries of Our Lady of LaSalette. His Spanish helped him there too, his sister said, since he often worked with young men from South America.

“He sees both sides of the Anglo-Hispanic situation. It’s difficult in Texas, as it is in Arizona,” said long-time family friend Elaine Jackson, a parishioner at St. Patrick Parish in Lufkin.

“We’re Anglo, and we love him to death!” she said. “We feel like he’s one of ours. We watched him grow up.”

Jackson said Bishop-elect Nevares is very devout, that he loves his family and that “he loves the Blessed Mother and Jesus very, very much.” But she called particular attention to his humility.

“I’ve already told him that I want him to stay humble, and I think he will,” Jackson said of the bishop-elect. “I’ll be talking to him if he doesn’t.”

She said Beatriz was so proud of her son.

“He sees the good in people,” Jackson said. “He’s going to reach a lot of people [as auxiliary bishop]. He’ll try to bring peace where things are chaotic.”

Bishop-elect Nevares headed up the first-ever Spanish-language program for the permanent diaconate in the Tyler Diocese. After five years of formation, 26 men were ordained permanent deacons.

Born in America

Richards’ first memory of her brother was shortly after his birth at the family’s home. She remembers seeing one of his hands open, and the other shut. Being around 4 years old at the time, Richard’s went over and opened his tiny little fist.

As it turns out, getting “stuck” in Texas rather than Chicago wasn’t the worse thing in the world, as far as his mother was concerned. Texas was closer to their family in Mexico.

“I have one foot on either side of the fence,” Bishop-elect Nevares said.

Seeing his father make a life for their family gave Bishop-elect Nevares an appreciation for the opportunities available in the United States.

He also noted the generosity of the United States in global humanitarian efforts. So he holds traditions from both Mexico and the United States in his heart.

“The beauty of being a bridge person is that it makes you open to all persons,” Bishop-elect Nevares said. “I understand all people are children of God. Every single person deserves respect.”