‘You are the people God has given me to love’: Bishop Mark ordained
By Heather Excell
“You are the people whom God has given me to love,” said Bishop Mark Freeman as he addressed the people of the Diocese of Ballarat at the conclusion of his episcopal ordination Mass on 19 March.
Bishop Freeman was ordained the ninth Bishop of Ballarat at St Patrick’s Cathedral, Ballarat, on the feast of St Joseph. He asked the faithful of the diocese for their prayers as he takes up his new role as their shepherd.
“Already I have experienced your deep faith,” he said. “I ask you to teach me how to be your bishop.”
The ordination Mass was celebrated by Melbourne Archbishop Peter Comensoli, who served as consecrator, with co-consecrators Ballarat’s Bishop Emeritus Paul Bird CSsR, and Hobart’s Archbishop Tony Ireland. Clergy and faithful from across Australia attended the celebration with many more joining via livestream.
During his homily, Archbishop Comensoli reflected on the Gospel in which Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?”, describing the call to be a bishop as a call to a life of sacrificial love.
“All the bishops, including this bishop speaking to you, know how utterly inadequate we are in living up to this kind of love,” he said. “Yet it is to this measure that we are called. To exercise in our apostolic mission Christ’s sacrificial love for his people.”
Archbishop Comensoli pointed to St Joseph as a model for the ministry of a bishop.
“Protector, teacher, and guide. Provider, exemplar, and encourager. Those characteristics of St Joseph point to the overseeing of God’s people that is to imbue the character of a bishop.”
He asked the people of the Diocese of Ballarat to pray for their new bishop, that he may be strengthened to live the promises made on the day of his ordination.
At the conclusion of the Mass, Bishop Freeman spoke with gratitude as he addressed the congregation for the first time as Bishop of Ballarat, thanking those who had supported him and asking them to keep him “grounded and in touch with Christ”.
He became emotional as he spoke about the episcopal ring he received during the Mass, made from his parents’ wedding rings.
“They loved me into life, and they loved me through life,” he said. “They taught me what it is to commit yourself in love. I feel sure that they are watching over me and guiding me to love you all with the same deep love I experienced from them.”
Reflecting on the Gospel passage he had chosen many years ago for his priestly ordination, Bishop Freeman said he now understood more deeply what it means to follow Christ.
“I willingly stretch out my arms to be led where I didn’t expect to go. I am willing because I know that I do not take this journey alone. We will journey together, and we will journey with our Christ.”