HE MAY still be getting used to being called “Father”, but newly-ordained Fr Christopher Knapman has big plans to re-energise the Catholic diocese of Broome.
Speaking to The Record just two days after his ordination on June 21 at Our Lady Queen of Peace Cathedral in Broome, Fr Christopher said he was looking forward to the challenge of ministering in one of Australia’s most remote dioceses.
“I’m really hoping to help people reconnect with the Church and to encourage them to strongly participate in the life of the Church – young people especially – and to just energise the community with the love of God and with their faith,” he said.
In the first ordination to the priesthood in Broome since 2011, Bishop Christopher Saunders told the congregation Fr Christopher’s ordination was a great blessing for the diocese.
“This Church has been served by great priests who have done so much to proclaim the Gospel in this most northern part of Western Australia,” he said. “These are Christopher’s ancestors in faith. It is upon their foundation and that of so many others that our new priest’s ministry will be built.”
The church was filled with hundreds of Broome’s Catholics, as well as Fr Christopher’s family and friends from Sydney, Perth, and even a Benedictine abbey in England. Many Aboriginal people from all over the Kimberley travelled from their own remote communities to attend the ordination as well.
At just 28, Fr Christopher is the youngest of the 12 priests in the diocese of Broome, but he says he’s not daunted by the prospect of life as a remote priest.
“It will have its own challenges, it will be a very colourful life, a very different and interesting life, but one where you’ll never know what’s going to happen in your day,” he said. “The isolation will be difficult, but I’ve gotten used to that over the years. But the flipside is that… in some ways you belong to a network of people much closer than priests in the city might.”
After studying journalism for two years, Fr Christopher spent four years studying for the priesthood in the diocese of Broken Bay in NSW, before a two-year stint volunteering in the Kimberley convinced him to transfer to the Broome diocese.
“It was a complete spur of the moment decision to go somewhere where I had never been and experience something I had never experienced. It was a leap in the dark,” he said.
Fr Christopher has been appointed as the assistant priest at Dampier Peninsula Parish, which consists of churches and schools in Beagle Bay and Lombadina.
While he admits the idea that he is now a priest “hasn’t quite sunk in yet”, Fr Christopher says he’s excited about the road ahead.
“I think it will a wonderful thing to be a young priest. I have a strong hunch that these years as a young priest will be the best years,” he said.
“I have a wonderful opportunity to really serve the people here, especially the Aboriginal people of the community. Being ordained is a privilege and I intend to do my best.”