Monthly Archives: September 2025

Checchio to be Coadjutor of New Orleans

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Today it was announced that the Most Rev. James Checchio (59), the 5th Bishop of Metuchen, New Jersey has been appointed by Pope Leo XIV to become the Coadjutor Archbishop of New Orleans, Louisiana. He expects to take up his new responsibilities in late November. His current coat of arms will need slight modification to add another row of tassels to the galero and a second horizontal bar to the cross. However, it is customary for a Coadjutor Archbishop or Bishop to use his personal arms alone on the shield until such time as he succeeds to the See and then he may marshal his personal arms with those of the See on the same shield.

Bishop Checchio has served as Bishop of Metuchen since 2016. He will assist the Most Rev. Gregory Aymond (75) in the duties of shepherding the Archdiocese of New Orleans until the conclusion of their current bankruptcy proceedings which are expected to last until the end of this year. As Coadjutor Archbishop, Checchio will then automatically have the right immediately to succeed to the See.

It just so happens that it was my great privilege and pleasure to prepare the armorial bearings for Archbishop Aymond when he became Archbishop of New Orleans in 2009.

Another UK Archbishop

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After seeing my recent post about the coat of arms of the Archbishop of Southwark another readers reader of this blog pointed out to me the coat of arms of another prelate from the UK. Archbishop Paul Gallagher (71) is the Secretary for Relations with States & International Organisations, in the Secretariat of State of the Holy See.

Ordained for Liverpool in 1977 he entered the diplomatic corps of the Holy See in 1984. Gallagher previously served as Nuncio to Burundi, to Guatemala and to Australia. He had also served as an official in Tanzania, Uruguay and the Philippines and became an archbishop in 2004.

Archbishop of Liverpool (updated)

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After recently posting the armorial achievement of the Archbishop of Southwark another reader of this blog was kind enough to send me the armorial bearings of the Most Rev. John Sherrington (67), the current Metropolitan Archbishop of Liverpool. Archbishop Sherrington, installed last May was previously an Auxiliary Bishop of Westminster and, prior to that, was a priest of the Diocese of Nottingham.

(artwork: Quentin Peacock)

Archbishop of Southwark, UK

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One of my regular readers recently sent me this rendering of the armorial bearings of the Most Rev. John Wilson (57), the current Metropolitan Archbishop of Southwark. The archdiocese takes in everything in London south of the River Thames and the County of Kent. (London north of the Thames is the Archdiocese of Westminster, making London one of the only cities to contain not only more than one diocese but actually to contain two ARCHdioceses).

It is interesting to note the quartering with the pall (pallium). This mirrors the original use of the pall. In the days before diocesan coats of arms the pall was employed by any Metropolitan Archbishop as a heraldic charge indicating his status as a Metropolitan.

Parish of St. Matthew

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I recently was commissioned to design a coat of arms for the Parish of St. Matthew in Flint, Michigan.

BLAZON:Quarterly, the horizontal line wavy, Azure and Argent overall a cross moline quartered and Counterchanged;  in the first and fourth quarter a mullet of six points Or; in the second and third quarter a money bag Gules bound Or.

EXPLANATION: The armorial bearings of the Parish of Saint Matthew, Flint, Michigan in the Diocese of Lansing reflect its location and it titular patron saint. The cross is not only the symbol of our faith and of the center of activity in any parish but in this form is borrowed from the diocesan coat of arms to indicate the parish is located in that diocese. The horizontal division line has been made wavy as a reference to the Flint River, and so as a reference to the city in which the parish is located. The money bags are a symbol of the parish’s patron, St. Matthew who was a tax collector before he became a disciple. The six-pointed star is from the arms of St. Pius X who was pope at the time the parish was erected. In addition, part of the former parish of St. Pius X has been incorporated into the parish of St. Matthew, so it alludes to that as well.

The blue and white motif from the diocesan coat of arms predominates throughout. The money bags are red to recall St. Matthew’s martyrdom. By means of these symbols the coat of arms of the parish alludes to both its patron and the local church in which it is located.