Bishop Emeritus Frank Dewane, who led the Diocese of Venice in Florida for nearly two decades until his retirement earlier this year, died on Oct. 7 at 76 years old.
His death was confirmed in a news release by current Bishop Emilio Biosca Agüero, OFM Cap, who was appointed to that role in May.
“It is with profound sadness, yet with faith in the promise of the Resurrection, that I announce the passing of the Most Reverend Frank J. Dewane, Bishop Emeritus of the Diocese of Venice in Florida,” Agüero said.
Dewane died at 3 a.m. at Sarasota Memorial Hospital “surrounded by close family and friends,” the prelate said. A cause of death was not immediately given.
Born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on March 9, 1950, Dewane was ordained in that diocese on July 16, 1988. Prior to his ordination he worked for NBC in Moscow and also worked at a subsidiary for Pepsi in New York.
Among his roles prior to his consecration as bishop, Dewane served as a member of the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations in New York and as the undersecretary of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.
He was named a coadjutor bishop of the Venice Diocese in 2006 by then-Pope Benedict XVI and was ultimately installed as bishop there on Jan. 19, 2007. He retired from that role on May 13 after nearly 20 years of service there.
Among his other roles in the U.S. Church were chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ domestic justice committee as well as on the bishops’ ad hoc Committee Against Racism.
Near the end of his tenure, in 2025, he spoke out against what he described as the “corrosive” rhetoric of U.S. federal officials who were intending to build a detention facility in the Everglades meant to house immigrants in the country illegally.
“Decency requires that we remember individuals being detained are fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters of distressed relatives,” the bishop said at the time.
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