CHARLESTON, W.VA. — Pope Leo XIV appointed Evelio Menjivar-Ayala, an auxiliary bishop in Washington, D.C., as the new bishop of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, which comprises the entire state of West Virginia. Menjivar-Ayala will be installed on July 2, 2026, succeeding Mark Brennan, who has led the diocese since 2019.

Menjivar-Ayala will oversee 61,000 Catholics and 92 parishes across West Virginia, a state where 2.4% of the population is Latino and 92.6% of its 1.77 million residents identify as white. By contrast, more than 40% of parishioners in the Washington archdiocese are Latino.

"I accepted my new role with great joy and humility," Menjivar-Ayala said at a Friday news conference. "I have much to learn, but my heart is ready and wide-open," he said during his introductory speech.

Menjivar-Ayala was born in Chalatenango, El Salvador, on August 14, 1970, and fled the country's civil war as a teenager in the late 1980s. He and his family had been fired upon by soldiers while fleeing their home during the war. After two failed attempts hindered by deportation and a guide abandoning the group, he entered the United States on his third attempt in 1990, hidden in the trunk of a car. Within a couple of weeks of his arrival, he gained humanitarian protection, and was later granted a visa as a religious worker. He became a U.S. citizen about two decades ago. Once settled in the U.S., he learned English, earned a GED, and worked janitorial and construction jobs before beginning studies for the priesthood at a parish in Silver Spring, Maryland. In 2023, he became the first Salvadoran bishop in the United States. Reflecting in 2025 on migrants facing deportation, he said, "That could have been me."

Brennan, 79, took over the diocese after a scandal involving a former bishop's sexual harassment of adults and lavish spending of church money. "But he loves all the people here. He's not going to be bishop just for one group within the diocese. He'll be bishop for all the people. I can assure you of that," Brennan said at the news conference.