Salt Lake Bishop

The Holy Father has named as the new Bishop of Salt Lake City, Bishop John Charles Wester, who has up to now been Auxiliary Bishop of San Francisco (the previous Bishop of Salt Lake City, the Most Reverend George H. Niederauer, is currently Archbishop of San Francisco).

Bishop Wester was born in San Francisco in 1950, attended parochial school and then the Archdiocese’s St. Joseph's High School Seminary. He studied theology at St. Patrick's Seminary in Menlo Park. He was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese in 1976. He served first as Parochial Vicar at St. Raphael's Parish in San Rafael until 1979, then Principal and teacher at Marin Catholic High School until 1986, then Assistant Superintendent of Catholic Schools for the Archdiocese until 1988 when he was named Administrative Assistant to then-Archbishop William Levada (now Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrin of the Faith).

In 1993 Bishop-elect Wester was named Pastor of St. Stephen's parish where he served until 1997 when he was named the Archdiocese's Vicar for Clergy. He retained that position after being named and consecrated Auxiliary Bishop the following year. Within the U.S. Bishop’s Conference he has been involved in Migration, Vocations, and Inter-religious Dialogue.

During his pastoral ministry he also obtained two Master’s degrees: one in Pastoral Counseling from Holy Name College in Oakland and the other in Spirituality from the University of San Francisco.