So, Whatever Happened To Fr R Scott Hurd?

Fr Hurd was quietly replaced as vicar general off the OCSP on July 31, 2014. (The announcement in the link mentions his replacement, Fr Hough III, but makes no mention of Hurd, his predecessor.) Interestingly, Fr Hurd had originally been appointed for a three-year term:

The Rev. R. Scott Hurd, a priest of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, will assist Steenson for three years with the title of vicar general. Hurd, also a former Episcopal priest, is married with three children.

Married Episcopal and Anglican priests who become Roman Catholic priests may remained married but cannot marry again if their wives die.

For whatever reason, Fr Hurd's term as vicar general was cut short. I really didn't think much about Hurd until I saw the 2012 press release about the Mount Airy group the other day, in which he referred to himself by full name and title within three short paragraphs, indicating he felt he was as important as anyone else in the hierarchy and certainly a bigger deal than the 17 Maryland bumpkins who were received.

That reminded me that Fr Hurd was certainly as big a showboat as Fr Phillips -- but if he was such a grandstander, why have we heard so little from him since his days as vicar general? After some googling, I put this question to my regular correspondent, but I was a bit disconcerted by a photo of him in civilian clothes at his publisher's web site with the note in his thumbnail:

He lives in his hometown of Alexandria, Virginia, with his three children.

This is usually a tell that he is no longer married to the children's mother, and this could potentially have been an issue for the Archdiocese of Washington. After quite a bit of research, my regular correspondent got back to me:

I see a wedding picture (his, to someone named Diane) on his Facebook page from May of this year. His wife was previously identified as someone named Stephanie. Profile pic from 2015 is of him and his three kids. Of course he would not have been able to remarry had he remained an active priest.

I found it interesting that in the 2011-12 timeframe, he was grandstanding extensively on his expertise in the subject of married Catholic priests. By 2016, he appeared only as "Mr. Scott Hurd, Catholic Charities USA" on the very large Planning Committee for "the annual Catholic Social Ministry Gathering . . . organized by the Department of Justice, Peace and Human Development in collaboration with 4 other USCCB departments and 16 national Catholic organizations". 

He was still a priest in June 2015, although his thumbnail as conductor of the Dominican Retreat still listed him as vicar general of the OCSP, when this was by that time a year out of date. My regular correspondent concluded only,

I am surprised that he was able to be laicised. I thought that was close to impossible these days.

I assume he had connections. But at least he's stopped showboating, huh? I betcha Fr Bartus knows a lot more. This actually strikes me as a rather, er, Episcopalian situation.