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Meet Bishop Doran

The Most Reverend Thomas G. Doran, Bishop of Rockford, currently holds two posts in the Vatican Curia.

• In September 2000 the Holy Father appointed him a member of the Vatican’s highest court, the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura. (He and Cardinal Francis Brennan, who was a member in the late 1960s, are the only Americans ever to serve on this body.)

• On March 31, 2001the Holy Father appointed him a member of the Congregation for the Clergy, which oversees the formation of diocesan priests and deacons and establishes norms for catechesis and reviews catechetical materials developed around the world.

Bishop Doran is a native of Rockford and attended St. James Catholic Grade School, Campion High School, Loras College and St. Pius X Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa, graduating in 1958.

Bishop Doran was assigned to Theological Studies in Rome by then Bishop Loras T. Lane. He studied theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, where he was awarded a Licentiate in Sacred Theology in 1962. He was ordained to the priesthood on December 20, 1961 in the Basilica of St. Peter, Vatican City. Upon his return to the Diocese of Rockford, he was assigned as assistant pastor at St. Joseph Parish in Elgin. In 1963, he was transferred to St. Peter Parish in South Beloit, where he served as assistant pastor and part-time Secretary to Bishop Lane.

The latter post soon became a full-time assignment and Bishop Doran thereafter served in many capacities in the administrative, judicial and pastoral areas of the Rockford Diocese.

Bishop Doran returned to Rome to complete a doctorate in Canon Law from 1975 -1978. He then returned to the diocese, where he served as Chancellor, Judicial Vicar, Vicar for Catholic Education and rector of St. Peter Cathedral.

In the Spring of 1986, the Holy Father appointed him to be a Prelate Auditor of the Roman Rota. He served on the Roman Rota until his appointment as Bishop of Rockford in April, 1994. Bishop Doran was ordained and installed as Eighth Bishop of Rockford on June 24, 1994.

Bishop Doran currently serves on the National Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Canonical Affairs Committee, the Ad Hoc Committee to Oversee the Use of the Catechism, the Subcommittee to ReDraft of the U.S. Bishops’ Application of Plan to Implement Ex Corde Ecclesiae, the Subcommittee to study the Interdicasterial Instruction on Certain Questions Regarding the Collaboration of the Non-Ordained Faithful in the Sacred Ministry of Priests, Ad Hoc Committee on the Forum, Committee on Women in Society and in the Church.

He also is President of the Institute on Religious Life, a member of the Commission on Science and Human Values, a member of the board of Catholics United for the Faith, a member of Common Ground Initiative, and a member of the board of the National Rural Life Conference.

He formerly served as a member of the Administrative Committee of the National Council of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) and as a member of the Administrative Board of the U.S. Catholic Conference (USCC).

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