Bishop John Walter Yanta

Bishop John Walter Yanta

John Walter Yanta was born on October 2, 1931 and grew up on a small ranch near the rural town of Runge, Texas. It was a hardscrabble existence for the Yanta family and many others in the depth of the Great Depression. His parents sold vegetables in town. They raised chickens and hogs to sell, and his mother sewed clothes for her children from feed sacks. He and his siblings attended public schools, until high school, when John Walter attended Central Catholic High School in San Antonio. There he made the decision to follow a religious calling and entered Saint John’s Seminary. He rose quickly in the church, impressing his superiors by meeting and exceeding every new challenge. In the 1960s Father Yanta started SANYO, the San Antonio Youth Organization. He developed this anti-poverty program into one of the most successful and largest programs in the United States. He was later appointed editor-in-chief for the Archdiocese of San Antonio’s newspaper, Today’s Catholic. Next, he started and served as executive director for CTSA, Catholic Television, San Antonio.

In 1989, Father Yanta was elevated to monsignor. On December 30, 1994, during an outdoor Mass near the famous oak in Panna Maria, he was consecrated as the first descendant of Panna Maria’s Polish founders to become a bishop. He is now Bishop Emeritus of Amarillo. He is revered as the visionary, organizer, recruiter, and major donor of the Polish Heritage Center at Panna Maria whose mission is to honor the hardworking Polish immigrants, who retained their faith and family values, their traditions and culture, and their identity as Poles and Catholics.