Vatican
City, 6 June 2013
(VIS) – Today the Holy Father appointed Fr. Lionginas Virbalas,
S.J., as bishop of Panevezys (area 13,000, population 390,000,
Catholics 320,000, priests 98, religious 76), Lithuania. The
bishop-elect, previously rector of the Pontifical Russian College of
St. Therese of the Child Jesus in Rome, Italy, was born in Birzai,
Lithuania, in 1961 and was ordained a priest in 1991. Since
ordination he has served in several academic, pastoral,
institutional, and diocesan level roles, most recently as: consultor
of the Jesuit Provincial Curia in Lithuania (2003); adjunct secretary
general of Lithuania's Episcopal Conference (2005-2009); and pastor
of St. Casimir parish in Vilnius (1997-2005 and again from
2009-2010). He succeeds Bishop Jonas Kauneckas, whose resignation
from the pastoral care of the same diocese the Holy Father accepted,
upon having reached the age limit.
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