John Bathersby

John Alexius Bathersby (26 July 1936 – 9 March 2020) was an Australian bishop of the Roman Catholic Church. He was the sixth archbishop of the Archdiocese of Brisbane, serving from 1991 until his retirement in 2011. Bathersby was conferred with the title Emeritus Archbishop of Brisbane.

Early years Bathersby was born in Stanthorpe, Queensland. The son of John Thomas and Grace Maud (née Conquest), he had an older sister, Carmel, a younger brother, Michael, and two younger sisters, Suzanne and Anne. He received his primary schooling at St Joseph's School in Stanthorpe (1941–50) and his secondary schooling as a boarder at Nudgee College in Brisbane (1951–54). From school he entered the Pius XII Provincial Seminary, Banyo, where he began his training for the priesthood and, on completion of those studies (1955–61), he was ordained a priest in his home parish of Stanthorpe by Bishop William Brennan on 30 June 1961.

His first seven years as a priest were spent as an assistant and administrator at Goondiwindi before being sent to Rome in 1969 for further studies where he completed a licentiate in theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University and a diploma in spirituality at the Pontifical Theological Faculty Teresianum. In 1972 he was appointed to the staff of Pius XII Seminary in Brisbane where he was a spiritual director for seven years before returning to Rome for a doctorate in theology and spirituality in 1979. He returned to the seminary before being appointed Bishop of Cairns in 1986.

Bathersby was a member of the International Catholic-Methodist Dialogue from 1989 to 1995 and a member of the executive of the Confederation of Bishops' Conferences of Oceania from 1991 to May 1994. He was co-chairman of the Australian Catholic–Uniting Church Dialogue. From July 1997 he served as President of the National Council of Churches in Australia until July 2000. In January 2001, Pope John Paul II appointed Bathersby as co-chair of the International Anglican-Roman Catholic Working Group (IARCCUM). He chaired the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference Commission for Mission and Faith Formation, and was a member of the Bishops' Permanent Committee.

Upon turning 75 years old, in July 2011, Bathersby sought the pontiff's consent to retire. The Bishop of Lismore, Geoffrey Jarrett, was appointed administrator for the Brisbane archdiocese in November 2011 and, in April 2012, Mark Coleridge was appointed as the seventh archbishop.

Bathersby died on 9 March 2020 at Brisbane's Wesley Hospital from a stroke.

In popular culture In 2011, a feature documentary was made about Kennedy and the exiled community and their conflict with the Catholic Church, entitled The Trouble with St Mary's.

In 2016, the play St Mary's in Exile was written by David Burton about the events that led to Bathersby's decision to remove Father Peter Kennedy as parish priest from St Mary's Catholic Church, South Brisbane in 2009. It was performed in August–September 2016 as part of the Brisbane Festival at the Queensland Theatre Company's Bille Brown Theatre, approximately 250m from both St Mary's and St Mary's in Exile. Actor Josh McWilliam played the role of Bathersby.