Monsignor Colin Bircumshaw appointed vicar general for Diocese of Salt Lake City

Intermountain Catholic

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Bishop John C. Wester (right) has named Monsignor Colin Bircumshaw (left) to replace Monsignor J. Terrence Fitzgerald as vicar general. Msgr. Fitzgerald will retire in June.

SALT LAKE CITY — As Monsignor J. Terrence Fitzgerald steps down after a total of 19 years as vicar general, the Most Rev. John C. Wester, bishop of Salt Lake City, has appointed Monsignor Colin Bircumshaw to take the post.

Msgr. Bircumshaw has been pastor at Saint Ann Parish in Salt Lake City since 2003 and also serves as the diocesan vocation director, among other posts. (For a partial list of his previous assignments, see sidebar, below.)

Msgr. Fitzgerald will retire in June.

"Msgr. Fitzgerald has held just about every role that a person can hold in a diocese," Bishop Wester said at the Feb. 11 meeting of Pastoral Center staff at which the appointment was announced. "He’s been associate pastor, pastor director of Catholic Community Services, principal, vicar general, vicar for clergy, administrator of the diocese twice, president rector of Mount Angel Seminary, spiritual director, counselor, a priest mentor, a supply priest. He’s been a board member, a real estate broker, a building contractor, an investment banker and an all-around nice guy.

"Having said all that," the bishop continued, "it’s bit of a danger because you’re saying to yourself, ‘Well, who the heck is going to fill those shoes? Who would want to try?’"

He then named Msgr. Bircumshaw, whom he called "a man of many talents" to the post of vicar general.

The bishop said he knows Msgr. Bircumshaw assumes the job with a bit of trepidation, and he thanked him for taking on the task. "It’s not an easy one," he said.

Bishop Wester described the vicar general as the bishop’s right-hand person who is in charge of the Pastoral Center, which supports all the diocese’s ministries, including parishes, schools and vocations.

Leaving the parish will be difficult for Msgr. Bircumshaw, and the parishioners won’t want him to go, Bishop Wester said. "When you hear the wailing and crying and gnashing of teeth coming from 21st South (where Saint Ann Parish is located), you’ll know what that is about."

In his remarks, Msgr. Bircumshaw thanked the bishop for his trust. "It’s true, no one in his right mind would want to follow Msgr. Fitzgerald," Msgr. Bircumshaw said. "To be honest, I’m frightened by the job, but I’ve been frightened by every job I’ve taken…. I have to keep telling myself it’s not a job, it’s a ministry. It’s simply another form of the ministry that I said ‘yes’ to 36 years ago."

Msgr. Bircumshaw was born in Salt Lake City and attended West Kearns Elementary School and Kearns Junior High before moving to Ohio, where he attended high school and college at Pontifical College Josephinum. He entered Saint John’s School of Divinity in Collegeville, Minn. in 1971, where he earned a master’s degree in theology. He was ordained May 30, 1975 in the Cathedral of the Madeleine by Bishop Joseph L. Federal, and spent three years in Rome completing advance studies in theology. On Nov. 5, 2008, he was named Prelate of Honor to His Holiness by Pope Benedict XVI.