Canada: The hierarchy.

Many Canadians don't know the names of bishops outside their own diocese; so here is a little update on recent appointments.

Auxiliary Bishop Fred Colli of Ottawa, 49, has become Bishop of Thunder Bay, ON. Bishop Raymond Roussin, 59, of the diocese of Gravelbourg, SK, has become bishop of Victoria, BC. Bishop Remi De Roo, in this episcopal see for 37 years, retired at the end of February. Bishop Roussin's move left no vacancy because the (French) diocese of Gravelbourg has been suppressed, having shrunk in population to the size of a large parish.

The Archbishop of Edmonton, Joseph MacNeil, will reach his retirement age of 75 on April 15. His successor is Archbishop Thomas Collins, 52, who has to leave his neighbouring post at St. Paul's, AB, where he arrived only in the summer of 1997 from being rector at St. Peter's Seminary in London, ON.

In November of 1998 the Edmonton archdiocese announced the closing of half its churches, 66 parishes outside the city of Edmonton and 13 to 16 parishes inside. If carried through, it would leave 52 churches outside the city with Sunday service and 28 to 30 in the city. The closures are due to a sharp decline in the number of priests as well as the declining attendance of parishioners.

A number of dioceses in Northern Canada are in process of disappearing. Among them are Labrador-Schefferville, Moosonee, ON, and Grouard-McLennan in Alberta, and MacKenzie-Fort Smith in the Northwest Territories, all of them down to a handful of priests each.

An earlier change brought Halifax anew archbishop in the person of Bishop Terrence Prendergast, S.J., 55, auxiliary in Toronto. The London, ON, diocese received Bishop Richard Grecco, 53, as a new auxiliary. The new bishop of the Toronto Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy is Bishop Cornelius Pasichny, O.S.B.M., 72, moved there from the Saskatoon, SK, eparchy, now vacant.

In Quebec two new auxiliary bishops have been appointed, one for the English section (Anthony Mancini, 54) and one as an additional bishop for the French-speaking population (Louis Dicaire, 42).

In Quebec, too, major reorganization of parishes will be necessary. The province with 7.5 million people has as many bishops (some 35) as English Canada where the bishops are spread out over a 6,000 kilometres-wide territory with 23 million people.

On November 1998 Cardinal Jean-Claude Turcotte of Montreal acknowledged that church attendance among French Quebeckers is now very low (in Montreal less than 8 per cent; in Hull-Gatineau, under seven percent, although it is somewhat higher among Montreal's Catholic English minority).

Meanwhile, the Quebec birthrate keeps falling: 85,130 registered births in 1996; 79,700 in 1997; and an expected 76,000 births in 1998.

Finally, Canada has a new Apostolic Nuncio in the person of Archbishop Paolo Romeo, 61, who most recently served in Colombia (since 1990). He replaces the retired Nuncio, Archbishop Carlo Curis.

Newfoundland schools

The Newfoundland Supreme Court has ruled against the Catholic bishops, who took the government to court over the constitutional change which removed churches from the education system. On January 14, the court dismissed the Church's challenge to the changes initiated by Brian Tobin and voted on in a province-wide referendum in October 1997. But the court did rule that the province had to pay $135,000 for the Church's campaign against the reform, as the government's "yes" side had an unfair advantage.