From the Bishop THE MONITOR: HOW DID YOU LEARN YOU WERE APPOINTED BISHOP OF TRENTON, AND HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR RESPONSE TO THE NEWS? BISHOP: It was May 24, 2010, a very busy day for me in the final months of my 12-year tenure as President of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. My cellphone rang around 7:30 a.m. but I was in the shower. I saw the Papal Nuncio’s phone number and name on the “missed call” log but I had Mass at 8 a.m. and, so, planned to call him back later. There was no message. Archbishop Pietro Sambi and I talked often so there wasn’t anything unusual about his call. I went to a staff meeting at 9 a.m. and he called again but I couldn’t take the call. No message. Around 10:30 a.m., I got in the car for another meeting, this one across town. The phone rang a third time and I picked up. “Where are you?” Archbishop Sambi asked. When I apologized for missing his calls and filled him in, he said, “Come over here (the Apostolic Nunciature) for lunch.” And so I did. I must confess, I never expected what he was about to tell me. After some typical light-hearted banter in his office, he looked at me and smiled. “The Holy Father would like you to be the Bishop of Trenton ... and he is not asking. Write a letter accepting and now let’s have lunch.” To say I was stunned is an understatement. Many of my predecessors as I must CUA President were bishops but it was confess, I never not a requirement of the job nor was it something I thought about. After all, I was a member of a religious community. expected what I had planned on taking a sabbatical he was about after CUA and then returning to teach to tell me. at one of our Vincentian universities or to do whatever my Provincial asked, so I was getting myself ready mentally to move on. I had heard rumors about being appointed a bishop occasionally but they came and went as rumors usually do. I had more important things to think about and paid little attention. So “surprise” is putting it mildly.
For Bishop, it’s been 10 years of
‘loving and serving the Lord Jesus and his people’
O
n July 30, Bishop David M. O’Connell, C.M., will mark the 10th anniversary of his ordination to the episcopacy, less than two months after being named Coadjutor Bishop of the Diocese of Trenton. The Bishop took some time with Rayanne Bennett, Associate Publisher of The Monitor, to look back on the day he first received the news of his appointment from Pope Benedict XVI, and the many highlights that have come in the decade that followed.
THE MONITOR: HOW WOULD YOU COMPARE YOUR EXERIENCES AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT, AND NOW, AS DIOCESAN BISHOP, AND WHICH ASSIGNMENT HAVE YOU FOUND MORE CHALLENGING? Newly ordained Coadjutor Bishop David M. O’Connell blesses the congregation in St. Mary of the Assumption Cathedral, Trenton, July 30, 2010, at the conclusion of the Mass at which he was ordained to the episcopacy. More than 1,000 people, including 300 priests and bishops, attended from around the country. Craig Pittelli photo
BISHOP: People ask me that all the time. Despite the similarities in some aspects of administration, each position has its unique challenges. My answer is a simple one: it depends on the day! I enjoyed my 12 years as President at CUA and my previous eight years as Academic Dean at St. John’s University in Queens, New York, before that. Those 20 years of executive administration Continued on 6
July 2020 THE MONITOR MAGAZINE 5