ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOP OF CHRISTCHURCH.

Kumara Times, Issue 3084, 21 September 1886, Page 3

ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOP OF CHRISTCHURCH.

The Eastern Star, a South African paper says :—“ A rumour is current in Port Elizabeth, and creates no little surprise, as well as consternation, to the effect that the Most Rev. Bishop Ricards has been appointed Bishop of the newly created Catholic Diocese of Christchurch, New Zealand. The information was said to have been received from here, and it was to the effect that Bishop Moran, Bishop Ricards’ old friend and coadjutor, had obtained for him the appointment to the new Christchurch Diocese adjoining his own. On inquiring at the convent here, we learn that there is unfortunately too much truth in the rumor. By the last mail from New Zealand Bishop Moran wrote that in consequence of the great spread of Catholicity in New Zealand, the Australasian Bishops assembled in Council at Sydney had petitioned his Holiness the Pope to erect a new See in Christchurch, and had begged Bishop Moran to nominate Bishop Ricards as Bishop of the new See. The council of Bishops also petitioned that an Archbishop should be placed over the islauds, and suggested to his Holiness that Dr. Moran was the most fit person for that dignity. We need not add that the news has been received here with equal consternation to that to which it gave rise to in Port Elizabeth, and the earnest prayer of every Catholic in the vicarate is that Dr. Ricards will not be induced to take leave of the people among whom he has labored since the days ol his early priesthood.”