Thomas John Joseph Paprocki

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THOMAS JOHN JOSEPH PAPROCKI

Born : August 5, 1952
Deceased :

Auxiliary Bishop of Chicago, 2003-2010
Bishop of Springfield in Illinois, 2010-Present

Auxiliary Bishop of Chicago

Bishop of Springfield in Illinois

Official blazon

(personal arms) Vert upon a Lattice Or an ogress charged with a cross patee throughout Argent; upon a chief Gules two pan balances of the second below a heart of the third, encircled by thorns and enflamed of the second.

Origin/meaning

As common in US episcopal heraldry, the arms show the arms of the diocese impaled with the personal arms of the bishop.

On a green field is seen a golden lattice, a device in which many individual slats form a single, integrated device of strength, far greater than all of its components. By the use of this device, Bishop Paprocki expresses that all aspects of Christian life, theology, church law and civil law, social involvements, form a framework of the total Christian. On the lattice is displayed an ogress on which is displayed a silver cross patee. The cross is derived from the "clan symbol" of the Paprocki's family in Poland and by its use His Excellenc y acknowledges, with great love and devotion, the heritage that has come to him from his parents, John and Veronica Paprocki.

The chief is red and contains a Sacred Heart, in silver and gold. The Sacred Heart is placed above two pan-balances, the symbol of justice and law, emblematic of the fact that Bishop Paprocki is both a civil and a church (canon) lawyer.

For his motto Bishop Paprocki uses the Latin motto "LEX CORDIS CARITAS." This phrase, which is based on the texts from the Prophet Jeremiah (Jer. 31:33), Saint Paul's Epistle to the Romans (Rom. 13:10) and the Second Vatican Council's Dogmatic Constitution on Te Church (Lumen Gentium (LG-#9)), expresses Bishop Paprocki's profound belief, as both a civil and a canon lawyer, that, truly, "the law of the heart is love."