Bermuda’s new Catholic Bishop will be ordained at a special ceremony tonight.

Bishop-elect Wieslaw Spiewak, from Poland, will take over as leader of the Island’s Catholic community from Bishop Robert Kurtz, who is retiring after 20 years in Bermuda.

A host of senior clerics from the Caribbean and Central America will join the service at St Theresa’s Cathedral, which starts at 5pm, to welcome the new Bishop to his post.

In attendance will be Governor George Fergusson; Michael Dunkley; Mary Ellen, the United States Consul General; and Charles Gosling, Mayor of Hamilton.

Also expected are the Acting Portuguese Honorary Consul, Andrea Moniz De Sousa, and the Italian Honorary Consul, Gioacchino Di Meglio.

The Anglican Bishop of Bermuda, Nicholas Dill, will be represented by Andrew Doughty, Archdeacon of the Anglican Church in Bermuda.

Bishop Spiewak, a member of the religious order the Congregation of the Resurrection, was ordained as a priest in his native city of Krakow in 1990.

He has worked and studied in both Poland and Italy and takes up his new role after serving as Provincial Superior of his order in Poland.

Bishop Spiewak is also a member of the Commission of the Polish Bishops’ Conference for the pastoral care of Polish emigrants and a member of the board of directors of the Conference of Major Superiors of the male religious orders in Poland.