By Kerry Myers
IF BISHOPS dodge confrontation, we should not be too surprised when others “go missing”, too, the Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, said.
He said Bishops needed to be courageous “because Christian truths do not always win majority approval”.
“But every stand for truth, justice and charity, for life and for goodness will strengthen your brothers and sisters in faith, and often in the wider society and inspire them to stand firm and make sacrifices, too,” the Cardinal said in his homily at the Mass of Episcopal Ordination for Bishop Peter Comensoli.
Bishop Comensoli, from the Diocese of Wollongong, was ordained as Auxiliary Bishop of Sydney by Cardinal Pell at St Mary’s Cathedral on 8 June. Archbishop Philip Wilson of Adelaide and Bishop Peter Ingham of Wollongong were principal co-consecrators.
Cardinal Edward Cassidy joined more than 20 Bishops, including the papal nuncio Archbishop Giuseppe Lazzarotto, in the Ordination Mass.
Bishop Comensoli, at 47, is the youngest Bishop in Australia.
A former chancellor of the Wollongong diocese, he studied the fundamentals of moral theology, and its philosophical and anthropological underpinnings, at the Academia Alfonsia in Rome.
He returned to Wollongong in December last year after completing a Masters of Letters in moral philosophy at St Andrew’s University in Scotland from 2006 to 2007, and undertook a PhD in theological ethics at Edinburgh University from 2007 to 2010.
He has since been serving in the parish of Helensburgh and teaching moral theology at the Catholic Institute of Sydney.
Cardinal Pell said of Bishop Comensoli that “through the wisdom of a succession of Bishops and through your own hard work you are unusually well qualified academically, as well as pastorally, to provide leadership in the struggle between good and evil, between the light of faith and the gathering darkness.
“Above all you are a teacher, as well as a servant, a leader and a sanctifier,” the Cardinal said.
“Your task will be to teach and explain that Jesus is the Son of God as well as Son of Mary, possessing a divine as well as a human nature, which enables Him to redeem us. No mere man could do this.
“Surveys show that even some priests, and certainly more people, Catholics, too, are unsure about the bodily resurrection of Jesus and even of the Virgin birth, of Christ’s divine fatherhood.
“This must mean that their faith in the divinity of Christ is under extreme pressure and this means that their faith in the redemption too is pressured.”
In welcoming the new Bishop, Cardinal Pell said he knew “you will answer these calls and rise to these challenges. The years ahead beckon and are rich with promise. May God continue to be with you and bless you for many decades, through the Spirit, in your new episcopal role as teacher, priest and shepherd.”
Bishop Comensoli was born in the Illawarra on 25 March, 1964, the fourth and last child of Mick and Margaret Comensoli.
He was baptised at St John Vianney Church, Fairy Meadow, the parish in which he would receive all the sacraments of Christian Initiation, as well as priestly ordination.
He was educated by the Good Samaritan Sisters at his parish school and later by the Marist Fathers at St Paul’s College.
Throughout his youth he was interested in music, playing the violin and being involved in the Sydney Youth Orchestra. After school, he worked for four years in the baking sector while undertaking a part-time Commerce degree at Wollongong University.
He entered St Patrick’s Seminary Manly in 1986 at the age of 21.
His biography states that Bishop Comensoli is a “Wollongong Boy” through and through – except for his persistently defiant support of the Manly Sea Eagles.
He paid tribute to his family, saying he is “especially glad to belong to a family that has enabled him to be a proud Catholic Christian”.