Now that he’s retired, Cardinal Timothy Dolan is staying put in New York as he fields book and documentary offers —and that’s also keeping him in the political limelight.
The beloved former head of the New York Archdiocese, which contains one of the country’s largest groups of Catholics, this week spoke out against everything from “what might be high-handed tactics by ICE’’ to antisemitism.
Cardinal Timothy Dolan officially gives up his role as archbishop of New York at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Friday. Getty Images
He urged the Trump administration to “try to tone this down’’ when it comes immigration sweeps that are roiling the nation, even as he said border protection is important.
“I’m kinda grateful the president … is now tempering things,’’ Dolan, 76, told the outlet the Free Press.
Dolan has told Fox he already received several offers to write a book and also to make a documentary after retiring as head of the archdiocese earlier this month.
He told the Free Press he’s also gotten “a bunch of invitations’’ to go around visiting parishes.
Either way, he will be staying in New York, where he has been living in a mansion on Fifth Avenue adjacent to St. Patrick’s Cathedral, he said.
Dolan, who was born in Missouri, admitted he was nervous about moving to the Big Apple at first.
“You have all these stereotypes of New York. … ‘I hear they’re mean there, they’re impersonal, they’re cold. I hear they’re pagans, ’’ said Dolan, who was appointed archbishop in 2009.
Dolan was replaced by Illinois Bishop Ronald Hicks. AFP via Getty Images
“None of that stuff was true.’’
He said it didn’t take long for him to feel like an adopted New Yorker.
A few months after he became archbishop, “I was at Yankee Stadium, they happened to be playing the [St. Louis] Cardinals,’’ he told the outlet, referring to his Midwest favorite team.
“One of the guys says to me sitting nearby, ‘Aren’t you Archbishop Dolan?’ And he said, ‘Well, you know, we understand you can root for the Cardinals. So don’t you be embarrassed rooting for the Cardinals.
“ ‘And by the way, I hear you like beer. Can I buy you one?’ ” Dolan recalled.
“And I thought, ‘Bingo, I’m home!’ ”
The archdiocese did not respond to Post requests for comment Friday, when the new archbishop, Ronald Hicks, officially took the helm in a major event at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan.