August

New Pacific Bishops

The new Archbishop of Suva and Rotuma is Peter Loy Chong, who is 52. Archbishop Peter is a Fijian of Chinese descent. He served as parish priest in three diverse parishes in the archdiocese, studied at the Jesuit University of Santa Clara, California, in the USA, where he graduated with honours, and most recently lectured at Pacific Regional Seminary. He became the fourth Archbishop on June 8, succeeding Archbishop Petero Mataca who was Archbishop of Suva for 37 years.

The new Bishop of American Samoa-Pago Pago will be Fr Peter Brown CSsR, who is 65. He is the second Bishop of this territory and succeeds Bishop Quinn Weitzel, MM. Bishop Elect Peter was born in Greymouth and after joining the Redemptorists worked in Auckland and joined the then new Redemptorist mission in Samoa. When his order withdrew from Samoa he worked among the Samoan communities in Auckland. He brings to his diocese a deep knowledge and experience of local culture, fluency in the language, and West Coast charm.

We begin this month a new series (p. 32) on Scripture, on the fascinating Book of Revelation.The author has written for the Messenger before on Scripture. This time he is urging readers to do some specific reading of the book between articles. This interactive way of studying scripture can be very fruitful.