For many reasons I welcome the appointment of Bishop Shane Mackinlay as my successor in Brisbane where he will be a distinguished addition to the line of Archbishops.
Bishop Shane has shown himself an unusually gifted man in his years as priest in Ballarat and Melbourne and as bishop in Bendigo and beyond.
He has a fine mind, and he will bring intellectual firepower to his ministry as Archbishop and to public debate in Queensland and Australia. He will be able to dialogue intelligently with a culture which at many points is distant from Christian understandings.
He is also an experienced pastor who knows how to listen and who through his time as Master of Catholic Theological College in Melbourne remained a Parish Priest near Ballarat. As bishop, he has been able both to shepherd the Diocese of Sandhurst and to accept responsibility on the global stage.
He deals well with both the big picture and the nuts and bolts, which is why he is a capable administrator. That will serve him well in a diocese as large and as complex as Brisbane.
Temperamentally, he is not easily flustered, having about him a poise that makes him a good driver in heavy traffic. That too will serve him well as Archbishop at a time when the traffic can be heavy.
At 60 he is also of the right age and maturity to assume greater responsibility not only in Brisbane and Queensland but nationally and internationally.
As we look to the installation on 11 September 2025, I have no doubt Bishop Shane will bring these gifts and fresh energies to the Archdiocese of Brisbane, where he will be creative in pursuing the path of synodality into the future God is preparing. I am grateful to Pope Leo for this wise choice of a new Archbishop, and I commend Bishop Shane to you and your prayers as he prepares for this new mission.