Dear Friends in Christ,

Fr. Jeremy Leatherby has placed himself and others in a state of schism with the Roman Catholic Church. By his words and actions, Fr. Leatherby has incurred a latae sententiae (automatic) excommunication. This means that by his own volition he has separated himself from communion with the Roman Pontiff, Pope Francis, and other members of the Catholic Church.

Father Cesar Ageas, a beloved priest of the Diocese of Sacramento for nearly 24 years, died on Aug. 3 in Fair Oaks, where he resided at St. Mel Parish. He was 66 and had recently been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

Father Ageas was most recently parochial administrator and then pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Auburn from July 2012 until his retirement on June 30, 2019. He served for 23 years in seven parishes in the Diocese of Sacramento.

Before coming to Sacramento, he served for 13 years in two dioceses in Mindanao in the southern Philippines.

“My years in the diocese have been challenging, but also happy ones,” Father Ageas told Catholic Herald magazine in June 2019 when he retired. “I’ve had the opportunity to serve not only the Filipino community but also parishioners of various ethnicities and cultures.”

Father Bart coordinates Black Catholic Ministry with perspective of inclusive spirituality

Paulist Father Bart Landry, coordinator of the diocese’s Black Catholic Ministry since 2017, reminds “everyone working in this ministry that our spirituality is not exclusivity, but inclusivity, in which it is a spirituality of evangelization of how we as a people of faith have come through difficult times,” he says. “The benefit of that is sharing how God is actively at work in the sufferings of people.”

Father Bart, 50, has lived Black Catholic spirituality all his life. He was born and grew up Catholic in the small town of Church Point, Louisiana, where his family still resides.