Pope Leo XIV has appointed Bishop Steven Lopes of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter to serve as apostolic administrator of Australia’s Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of the Southern Cross, the Vatican announced May 11.
The appointment means Lopes will now oversee two of the three personal ordinariates established for former Anglicans who have entered full communion with Rome. The third ordinariate, Our Lady of Walsingham, serves the United Kingdom.
Lopes succeeds Archbishop Anthony Randazzo, who concluded his role as apostolic administrator of the Australian ordinariate after serving since July 1, 2023. Randazzo was named prefect of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Legislative Texts in March and will relocate to Rome after a three-month transition period.[3][4][2]
“As I conclude my time as apostolic administrator, I give thanks for the grace-filled growth of the Ordinariate and the faithful witness of its clergy and people,” Randazzo wrote on Facebook May 11. “It has been a privilege to serve the Ordinariate during this period of renewal and hope.”
Lopes was appointed apostolic administrator “sede vacante et ad nutum Sanctae Sedis”—with the see vacant and at the disposition of the Holy See. This suggests the Australian ordinariate leadership remains in transition, with no immediate plan to name a permanent ordinary.
In an email to ordinariate members, Lopes said he has been privileged to come to know the Australian ordinariate over the years and “to now be its custodian for a while”.
The California native has served as bishop of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter since 2016, when he became the first bishop appointed to lead the North American ordinariate. Ordained a priest in 2001, Lopes holds a doctorate in sacred theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and served as an official at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from 2005 until his episcopal appointment. The ordinariate’s cathedral is in Houston.
The Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of the Southern Cross encompasses 17 congregations across Australia, Japan, and Oceania. Personal ordinariates are non-territorial jurisdictions, similar to dioceses but defined by people with Anglican backgrounds rather than geography. Any Catholic may belong to or attend an ordinariate parish.
The Vatican reaffirmed its commitment to the ordinariates in March with the release of “Characteristics of the Anglican Heritage as Lived in the Ordinariates Established Under the Apostolic Constitution *Anglicanorum Coetibus*”. The document from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith highlighted distinctive features of Anglican patrimony preserved in the ordinariates, including an “ecclesial ethos” of active lay and clergy participation in church governance and emphasis on evangelization through beauty in worship, music, and art.
The appointment comes at a time of transition for the ordinariates globally, as they seek to establish stable governance structures while maintaining their distinctive Anglican heritage within Catholic ecclesiology. The North American ordinariate also underwent recent restructuring with the dissolution of its Canadian Deanery of St. John the Baptist. Canadian operations are now managed directly by the ordinariate’s chancery in Houston.
According to GCatholic.org, eight ordinariate communities remain in Canada: St. John the Evangelist in Calgary, Alberta; Our Lady of Walsingham Chapel at St. Thomas in Maple Ridge, British Columbia; Blessed John Henry Newman Fellowship at St. Columba in Victoria, British Columbia; and five Ontario communities—St. Edmund, King and Martyr in Cambridge; Good Shepherd in Oshawa; Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Ottawa; and St. Thomas More in Toronto. The restructuring reflects the ordinariate’s efforts to streamline governance across North America while maintaining pastoral care for geographically dispersed communities.