Bishop Juan Miguel Castro Rojas

Juan Miguel Castro Rojas is Bishop of San Isidro de El General, Costa Rica. He was born on 20 August 1966 at the Naranjo Clinic in Alajuela. He is the son of Enrique Castro Rodríguez and Miriam Rojas Sancho, whose marriage produced four children and whose home was in the community of Concepción in Naranjo; from a farming family, Monsignor Juan Miguel grew up among the coffee fields of the area and the joy of sharing the value of family and friendship. He was baptized on 27 August 1966 by Father Gonzalo Carranza Rojas, coadjutor of the Parish of Naranjo, and received the sacrament of confirmation in the same parish on 28 August 1976 from Father Miguel Ángel Herrera Sancho, as recorded in the parish register. He studied primary school at the Presbítero José del Olmo School in Concepción de Naranjo from 1973 to 1978, and secondary school at the Colegio Diurno de Naranjo from 1979 to 1983. Later, for a period of one year, he worked in an ornamental-cane packing plant, and in 1985 he entered the Central Seminary of Costa Rica in Paso Ancho, beginning priestly formation there, which concluded in 1990; years later he obtained the bachelor degree in theology. After ecclesiastical formation, he was ordained deacon on 1 May 1990 in Alajuela. At 24 years of age, he was ordained priest on 1 December 1990 in the Cathedral of Alajuela by the laying on of hands of Monsignor José Rafael Barquero Arce. He exercised priestly ministry as parish vicar of Pital (1991-1992), parish vicar of Ciudad Quesada (1993-1994), pastor of La Fortuna (1995), pastor of the cathedral in Ciudad Quesada (1996-2014), and pastor of Aguas Zarcas (2015-2021). During priestly ministry he also carried out several diocesan services, including member of the council for economic affairs of the Diocese of Ciudad Quesada (1996-2021), vicar general of the Diocese of Ciudad Quesada (2003-2013), responsible for priestly pastoral ministry for the Diocese of Ciudad Quesada (2015-2021), vicar forane of the San José vicariate (2015-2021), and vicar for catechesis, a service he exercised first in the Diocese of Alajuela and later in the Diocese of Ciudad Quesada. Appointed by Pope Francis as the fifth diocesan bishop for the Diocese of San Isidro de El General on 13 November 2021, he was ordained in the Cathedral of San Isidro de El General on 25 January 2022, the liturgical feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul the Apostle, by the laying on of hands of Monsignor José Manuel Garita Herrera, Bishop of Ciudad Quesada, Monsignor Bruno Musarò, Apostolic Nuncio in Costa Rica, and Monsignor Fray Gabriel Enrique Montero Umaña, Bishop Emeritus of San Isidro de El General, with the presence of the bishops of CECOR and of other conferences.