The Diocese of Reno () is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory, or diocese, of the Catholic Church in the northern Nevada region of the United States. It is a suffragan diocese, formerly of the ecclesiastical province of the metropolitan Archdiocese of San Francisco and, since May 30, 2023, of the Archdiocese of Las Vegas.
The mother church of the Diocese of Reno is St. Thomas Aquinas Cathedral in Reno. As of 2023, the current bishop of Reno is Daniel Mueggenborg.
Name changes
The diocese has undergone three name changes over the last 100 years:
Diocese of Reno (1931- 1976) Diocese of Reno-Las Vegas (1976-1995) Diocese of Reno (1995-present)
Territory
The Diocese of Reno is composed of 12 Nevada counties: Carson City Churchill Douglas Elko Eureka Humboldt Lander Lyon Mineral Pershing Storey Washoe
History
1860 to 1931
With the discovery of gold in the western foothills of Nevada in 1858, large numbers of miners started flooding into the region, establishing mining towns. That same year, Archbishop Joseph Alemany of the Archdiocese of San Francisco sent Reverend Joseph Gallagher to the mining towns to tend to the Catholic population. Two years later, the Vatican placed western Nevada under the new Diocese of Grass Valley in California. Bishop Eugene O’Connell of Grass Valley started sending more priests to Nevada to establish missions and build churches.
The first Catholic church in Nevada was constructed in Virginia City in 1860 to serve the miners in that town. Another Catholic church was constructed in Carson City around the same time. The first church in Reno was Saint Mary's, constructed there in 1871. St. Thomas Church, the future cathedral, was finished in Reno in 1910.
In 1915, Archbishop James J. Keane wrote a letter to the Apostolic Delegate to the United States, Diomede Falconio, advocating a bishop for Nevada, citing the difficulties of the California diocese in providing coverage there. However, nothing came from Keane's initiative.
While traveling west through Nevada by train during the 1920s, Cardinal George Mundelein, archbishop of the Archdiocese of Chicago, asked about which bishop was in charge of the state. When he found out that Nevada did not have its own bishop, he pushed the Vatican to establish a diocese there, offering support from his archdiocese.
1931 to 1986
Pope Pius XI established the Diocese of Reno on March 27, 1931. The pope named Reverend Thomas Gorman of the Diocese of Monterey-Los Angeles as the first bishop of Reno. At its founding, the diocese had a Catholic population of approximately 8,000.
Under Gorman, the diocese opened soup kitchens and homeless shelters in Reno in the 1930s as a response to the Great Depression. During World War II, he created USO centers for soldiers on leave, African-American wartime workers and residents in Boulder City. Gorman became coadjutor bishop for the Diocese of Dallas in 1952.
The second bishop of Reno was Robert Dwyer of the Diocese of Salt Lake City, named by Pope Pius XII in 1952. In 1966, Dwyer became archbishop of the Archdiocese of Portland. To replace Dwyer, Pope Paul VI in 1966 named Auxiliary Bishop Michael Green of the Diocese of Lansing as the new bishop of Reno. Green retired in 1974. Paul VI appointed Auxiliary Bishop Norman McFarland of San Francisco to succeed Green in Reno in 1976. That same year, the pope renamed the Diocese of Reno as the Diocese of Reno-Las Vegas to acknowledge the explosive population growth of Las Vegas. McFarland was appointed bishop of the Diocese of Orange in 1986.
1986 to 2010
The second bishop of Reno-Las Vegas was Auxiliary Bishop Daniel F. Walsh of San Francisco, named by Pope John Paul II in 1986. When the pope split southern Nevada into the new Diocese of Las Vegas in 1995, he named Walsh as its first bishop. The Diocese of Reno-Las Vegas reverted to the Diocese of Reno.
The first bishop of the reestablished Diocese of Reno was Bishop Phillip Straling from the Diocese of San Bernadino, named by John Paul II in 1995. Straling retired in 2005. That same year, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Monsignor Randolph Calvo of San Francisco as the next bishop of Reno.
In 2009, Calvo was named in a lawsuit by Richard DeMolen, the former pastor of Our Lady of Tahoe Catholic Parish in Zephyr Cove, Nevada. Calvo had fired DeMolen because the priest had refused to remove a restraining order he filed against a diocesan deacon. DeMolen claimed the deacon had sent him a death threat, which Calvo never investigated. The lawsuit was dismissed in 2010.