Now Bishop of the Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle.

Father Bill became our second Parish Priest and said his first Mass in the Parish on 24th July 1999.

Bill Wright is the third and youngest child of Jack and Nan Wright (both deceased). He has a sister, Patricia and a brother, Robert. He was born on 26 October 1952 in Washington DC, where his father, an economist with the Australian Central Bank (Commonwealth, later Reserve, Bank) was seconded to the International Monetary Fund.

The family moved to Australia when young Bill was only a baby. He was educated by the Sisters of Mercy at Pymble and by the Jesuits at St Aloysius’ College, Milsons Point, with two years at Wimbledon College, another Jesuit school, when Jack was London Manager of the Reserve Bank of Australia.

Father Bill nominates a Jesuit speaker during a Year 10 retreat as a trigger to priesthood, and admits to the feeling, at that young age, that “I’m just what the church needs”! While preparing for priesthood at St Columba’s College, Springwood (1971‐73) and St Patrick’s College, Manly (1974‐77), and attaining a Bachelor of Theology, he was employed by the parishes of St Mary’s (Western Sydney), Manly and Pymble as a youth worker. He says now that it is the role of young people “to stir, to rebel, to challenge – and to tell me where I’m going wrong!”

Bill Wright was ordained to the diaconate in October 1976 and to the priesthood on 20 August 1977 at St Mary’s Cathedral. After ordination, he gained a BA(Hons), largely in History, at Sydney University.

He has served as follows:

• 1977-79 Assistant priest, St Michael’s, Stanmore
• 1980-84 Studies at Sydney University
• 1985-91 Vice‐Rector, St Patrick’s College Manly
• 1992-94 On loan to Parramatta Diocese; assistant priest, Holy Family Mt Druitt
• 1995 Assistant Secretary, Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, Canberra
• 1996 Assisting at Fairfield for a few months; Administrator, Enmore‐Tempe (six months)
• 1997-98 Parish Priest, St Paul of the Cross, Dulwich Hill
• 1999-2005 Parish Priest, John the Baptist, Bonnyrigg
• 2006-07 Assistant priest St Francis Xavier’s, Moree (Diocese of Armidale) ‘on exchange’
• 2008-2009 Parish Priest, St Patrick’s Sutherland
• 2009-2011 Parish Priest, All Saints, Liverpool
• 2011- Current Bishop of the Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle.