Oscar Cantú is a U.S.-born prelate of the Catholic Church who is the third Roman CatholicBishop of San Jose. He was Bishop of Las Cruces, New Mexico, from 2013 to 2018 and before that Auxiliary Bishop of San Antonio, Texas, beginning in 2008. When he became a bishop in 2008, he was the youngest bishop in the United States. He is fluent in English, Spanish, Italian, and French.
Cantú spent his early career as a priest working in parishes throughout the Houston metropolitan area. His first assignment was as curate at St. Christopher Parish. He taught at the University of St. Thomas and at St. Mary’s Seminary, and served as pastor of Holy Name Parish. Cantú participated in a number of ministries and movements in Houston. He was involved in the Christian Family movement, conducted retreats with the youth of the CFM movement in the Galveston-Houston Archdiocese, and worked with the Engaged Encounter ministry. He was also involved in The Metropolitan Organization, which addresses fair housing, immigration, and education.
appointed Cantú titular bishop of Dardanus and auxiliary bishop of San Antonio in 2008. He was consecrated a bishop on June 2, 2008, by Archbishop José Horacio Gómez. At the time, he was the youngest bishop in the United States. He chose as his episcopal motto Zelus domus tuae comedit me.
On January 10, 2013, Cantú was named the second bishop of the Diocese of Las Cruces, New Mexico. He was installed there on February 28, 2013. At the time he was the youngest bishop to head a diocese in the United States.
Bishop of San Jose
appointed him coadjutor bishop of San Jose, California, on July 11, 2018. He was installed on September 28, 2018. As of May 1st, 2019, after the Holy Father accepted the request to retire of Bishop Patrick J. McGrath, Bishop Oscar Cantú became the third Roman Catholic Bishop of San Jose. He has served on several committees of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. He chaired its Committee on International Justice and Peace from 2015 to 2017. In that role he visited churches in some of the most troubled areas of the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, and Asia to represent the U.S. bishops in showing solidarity with the local churches like those of South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo that are under great duress. He twice visited Iraq and Cuba. In the Middle East, he visited churches in Gaza, Jerusalem, Israel, and the West Bank, advocating on behalf of the two-state solution, the long-held position of the church. And he spoke at the United Nations and in London in defense of the church's teaching in opposition the proliferation of nuclear weapons. He called for religious liberty in the Middle East, Indonesia, Malaysia, and India. He visited Japan in 2015 for the ceremonies marking the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. He was one of two delegates chosen by the bishops' conference to represent the USCCB at Pope Francis' visit to Mexico in February 2016.
