Gerhard Goebel (Bishop)

Gerhard Ludwig Goebel MSF (born December 1, 1933 in Scheuerfeld ; † November 4, 2006 in Kirchen (Sieg) ) was the Catholic Bishop of the Apostolic Prelature Tromsø .

Life

Gerhard Goebel joined in 1954 as a latecomer in Mühlbach in the novitiate of the Congregation of the Missionaries of the Holy Family in, put on 8 September 1955 his religious vows and received on 3 July 1960 at the "Hunsrück" in Ravengiersburg the priesthood . Since 1962 worked as a chaplain and teacher in Tromsø and as a pastor in Hammerfest in Northern Norway.

In 1977 he became Apostolic Administrator in Tromsø; In 1979 he was appointed prelate of Tromsø (approx. 1700 Catholics), in the northernmost diocese in the world, which stretches roughly from the Arctic Circle north to Svalbard. Pope John Paul II and the co- consecrators Duraisamy Simon Cardinal Lourdusamy , Archbishop of Bangalore and then Secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples , and Eduardo Cardinal Martínez Somalo , Archbishop and then official in the State Secretariat (Vatican) , donated to him on May 27, 1979 the episcopal ordination in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome . His motto as bishop was: "Iter para tutum" - "Safely escort us". The high point of his tenure was the visit of the Pope to Tromsø in 1989. His nickname was "Polar Bishop" because his episcopal church in Tromsø is about 350 km north of the Arctic Circle.

He held the office of bishop until his death; he died during his home leave in the hospital in Kirchen / Westerwald.

Web links

• Entry about Gerhard Goebel on catholic-hierarchy.org
• Gerhard Goebel (Norwegian)
• "Bonifatiuswerk mourns Bishop Goebel"