OTHER PONTIFICAL ACTS

Vatican City, 18 April 2013 (VIS) – Today, the Holy Father appointed:

- Bishop Djuro Hranic as metropolitan archbishop of Dakovo-Osijek (area 7,752, population 643,892, Catholics 548,137, priests 250, permanent deacons 1, religious 423), Croatia. Bishop Hranic, previously auxiliary of the same ecclesiastic circumscription, was born in Vinkovci, Croatia in 1961, was ordained to the priesthood in 1986, and received episcopal ordination in 2001, being assigned the See of Gaudiaba. The archbishop-elect succeeds Archbishop Marin Srakic, whose resignation from the pastoral care of the same archdiocese the Holy Father accepted, upon having reached the age limit.

- Fr. David J. Walkowiak as bishop of Grand Rapids (area 17,592, population 1,318,000, Catholics 179,500, priests 141, permanent deacons 40, religious 67), Michigan, USA. Fr. Walkowiak, of the clergy of the Diocese of Cleveland, Ohio, USA, was born in Cleveland in 1953, and was ordained to the priesthood in 1979. Holding a doctorate in Canon Law, he serves as an associate judge of the appellate tribunal for the Province of Cincinnati as well as the pastor of St. Joan of Arc parish in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, USA. The bishop-elect succeeds Bishop Walter Allison Hurley, whose resignation from the pastoral care of the same diocese the Holy Father accepted, upon having reached the age limit.