Vatican City, Jan 30, 2007 / 09:10 am

Pope Benedict XVI announced Tuesday that the Most Reverend George V. Murry, S.J., has been appointed Bishop of the Diocese of Youngstown in northeastern Ohio. Bishop Murry is currently Bishop of St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands.

“I am honored to accept the Holy Father’s appointment to serve as Bishop of Youngstown and I look forward to meeting and working with the priests, deacons, religious, and laity of the diocese,” the bishop said in a statement this morning.

The date for Bishop Murry’s installation is already scheduled for March 28th.  Murray will be the fifth Bishop of the Diocese of Youngstown.  The Diocese had been without a bishop since March of 2005 when Bishop Thomas Tobin was appointed Bishop of Providence, Rhode Island.

Bishop Murry was born in Camden, New Jersey, in 1948. After graduating from Catholic elementary and high school, he attended St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia and St. Mary’s Seminary and University in Baltimore. In 1972 he entered the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) and was ordained to the priesthood in 1979. Bishop Murry holds a M.Div. degree from the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, California, as well as an M. Phil. and Ph.D. in American Cultural History from the George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

He has served as a professor of American Cultural History at Georgetown
University in Washington, D.C., President of Archbishop Carroll High School in Washington, D.C., and Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Detroit. In 1995 Pope John Paul II appointed him Auxiliary Bishop of Chicago. In May of 1998 Pope John Paul II appointed him Coadjutor Bishop of St.Thomas in the Virgin Islands and on June 30, 1999, appointed him bishop of the diocese.

The bishop has also served on numerous boards including the University of Detroit and Loyola Academy, both in Detroit; St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, Mount St. Mary’s College in Emmitsburg, Maryland and Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut. He is a member of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and serves on the Domestic Policy and Education Committees. Since November of 2002 he also serves on the Board of Directors of Catholic Relief Services, the overseas arm of the U.S. Bishops, which provides food, clothing, shelter and medicine for those in need.

Presently, Bishop Murry is preparing a book on the role of the American Church in the reception and resettlement of refugees from 1939 until 1980.