Pope Francis has named Father Chad W. Zielinski, a priest of the Diocese of Gaylord, Michigan, as the bishop of Fairbanks, Alaska. Bishop-designate Zielinski is currently serving in the Archdiocese for the Military Services as an Air Force chaplain and is stationed at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska. He succeeds Bishop Donald J. Kettler, who was appointed bishop of St. Cloud, Minnesota, Sept. 20, 2013. (CNS photo courtesy Diocese of Gaylord) Fr. Chad Zielinski, a priest of the Gaylord diocese and chaplain in the U.S. Air Force, will become bishop of the 410,000-square-mile Diocese of Fairbanks, Alaska, when he is ordained and installed there Dec. 15.
Born in Detroit but growing up in Alpena, Bishop-designate Zielinski was a Sacred Heart classmate of Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Michael J. Byrnes, who visited him in Alaska this summer.
“Bishop-elect Zielinski is a great friend of Jesus and will be a blessing to the priests and people of northern Alaska,” Bishop Byrnes said. “He is a genuinely ‘battle-tested’ servant of the Gospel. All of us who are honored to be counted among his friends are both sobered by the challenges he will face and encouraged by the wisdom of the Holy Father to appoint such a worthy bishop for this task.”
Bishop-designate Zielinski, 50, is currently serving in the Archdiocese for the Military Services and is on active duty stationed at Eielson Air Force Base about 25 miles southeast of Fairbanks.
His appointment to succeed Bishop Donald J. Kettler was announced Nov. 8 in Washington, D.C., by Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, apostolic nuncio to the United States.
"I was completely shocked," the newly named bishop said in a news release on the Gaylord diocese's website. "I just couldn't believe it. It is nothing I have ever even thought about."
"My simple approach to this call in life is to love the Lord my God with all my heart, all my soul and all my mind and serve my brothers and sisters in the Diocese of Fairbanks," he said.
Out of a total population of about 164,000 people in the northern Alaska diocese, about 7 percent are Catholic, or 11,000.
Detroit Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron, who was rector of Sacred Heart while Bishop-designate Zielinski was a student there, said the new bishop would be a “zealous and devoted pastor.”
"He will serve the Church in Fairbanks with an unwavering commitment to the way of Christ,” Archbishop Vigneron said. “We are proud to claim him as a son of the state and an alum of Sacred Heart Major Seminary."
Catholic News Service contributed to this report.
