New director for Office of Hispanic Ministry

Intermountain Catholic

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SALT LAKE CITY — Angel de Jesús García Zárate, the new director for the Diocese of Salt Lake City’s Office of Hispanic Ministry, has tremendous respect for his predecessor, Maria Cruz Gray, and understands the great legacy she has left him to carry on, he said.

Gray directed the office for more than two decades before retiring last November. For her service she received many national and local recognitions, including the 2012 Outstanding Diocesan Director of Hispanic Ministry Award from the National Catholic Association of Diocesan Directors for Hispanic Ministry.

“She is a pioneer in the Hispanic ministry and the Diocese of Salt Lake City,” Garcia said. “When she came here, there were only a few things for the Hispanic community, and she started to work and advocate for the Hispanic community,” resulting in “great programs in Christian formation” and “a beautiful community” to help in the missions. 

“I feel blessed because she’s still here around and I’ve received her advice and wisdom, and I am prepared to follow her legacy and also to do my part to serve the Church and do a good ministry for the Hispanic community,” he said.

A first-generation Mexican American whose parents immigrated from Tamaulipas, a Mexican state across the Rio Grande River from Houston, Texas, Garcia is excited to serve the people of the diocese, he said. He was drawn to the position by “the service: the service to the community, to the Hispanic community, to the Catholic Church. Catholic means universal. My heart is to serve the Church in a universal way.”

Garcia is a cradle Catholic. He grew up attending public schools in Houston. After high school he pursued a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and legal translation from the University of St. Thomas-Houston. For a time he was a member of the Somaschi, an Italian religious order that is dedicated to serving the poor, before discerning that his true calling lies in teaching.

He followed up his bachelor’s degree with Centro Semillero, a graduate program in pastoral and biblical studies theology that is taught in Spanish at the UST School of Humanities. 

“It was completely new; it was the first program in Spanish in the United States,” Garcia said. “It was great, and I started to feel more connected with theology and the passion of teaching to the Hispanic community.”

Garcia graduated from the program with a master’s degree in pastoral theology and followed it up a year later with another in Sacred Scriptures. During that time he taught and was a college advisor in the Galena Park Independent School District for five years. Following that he worked as a vice president of the Timonel Foundation, a Catholic nonprofit whose mission is to promote college education among the Hispanic community.

Garcia sees himself as a simple missionary bringing the faith to the People of God wherever they live in Utah.

“I remember Pope Francis saying that he wanted us to go out to the peripheries, and that was a beautiful calling from Pope Francis; and now that we have Pope Leo XIV and his background as a missionary, it also is helping me to see myself not only as a director of the Hispanic ministry, but as another missionary in the diocese,” he said. “That’s my calling right now.”

When family, friends or strangers “ask me what I’m going to do, I tell them I’m going to be a missionary in the Diocese of Salt Lake City, serving the Hispanic community,” he said, adding that he intends to get out in the diocese right away. 

“My plan right now is to visit the missions to introduce myself, to know more about them, to introduce myself to the priests around the diocese, and let them know that I’m here to help, to serve and to be part of this beautiful community in the Diocese of Salt Lake City,” he said.

He has already begun to implement that plan by attending the closing Mass of the priests’ retreat on June 5 and introducing himself there.

Ministering in a diocese that covers an entire state after being part of the Diocese of Houston will be a challenge, he said.

Acknowledging that it is a trying time for the Hispanic community, Garcia said, “I am here to serve, to help, to offer what the Church has to offer in social ministry and guiding especially, and – this is the most important – guiding the Church through a sacramental life. We are here to be a bridge between the Church and the community and the people in the United States.”

In Utah, he is looking forward to experiencing the four seasons, he said, because “I am from Texas, and we only have three summers and one short winter.”

The youngest of seven children and uncle to 18 nieces and nephews, Garcia has a passion for cooking that he developed during the Covid lockdown. He loves to create dishes for his family and friends, he said. 

Although his family will miss him, they are happy for him, he said. “They know about my service in the Church in Houston area, and they know that I’m ready for this and that I have been doing this in Houston, and I’m going to be doing this in Salt Lake City.”