Đakovo, October 3, 2001 (IKA) — The newly appointed auxiliary bishop of Đakovo and Srijem, Dr. Đuro Hranić, was ordained on September 22, during a celebration of the Eucharist at the Cathedral of St. Peter in Đakovo by the bishop of Đakovo and Srijem, Dr. Marin Srakić, assisted by the metropolitan archbishop of Zagreb, Josip Bozanić, and the apostolic nuncio in the Republic of Croatia, Archbishop Giulio Einaudi. Twenty-five bishops from Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, Hungary and Yugoslavia participated, together with over 230 priests and monks, many nuns, and approximately ten thousand of the faithful from the entire diocese.
Bishop Srakić pointed out in his sermon that “bishop is a designation for work and not for honor. It is necessary for a bishop to be more for service than at the head.” He explained the bishop’s motto of Msgr. Hranić — the words Jesus addressed to Peter [after speaking to the crowds from Simon’s boat] and quoted in the Apostolic letter of the Holy Father, At the Beginning of the New Millennium: “Duc in altum — Put out to the deep” [for a catch]. Addressing Msgr. Hranić, he said: “Now, you as a bishop must ‘put out to the deep.’” This is the deep of the third millennium, “the great Đakovo and Srijem Diocese, which suffered greatly during the war, both spiritually and materially. This is the deep of our destroyed parish communities which are recuperating from their wounds, our Second Diocesan Synod of Đakovo and Srijem by which we want with the power of the Holy Spirit to enter more profoundly into our diocesan community, confront its needs and requirements, work on the formation of engaged, serious lay faithful who are open to the Church and together with the bishops and priests will be engaged in apostolic work to build a better world through forgiveness and reconciliation and promotion of the community on the sensitive territory of ecumenical engagement. This is the deep of our social community in which Catholics, led by their bishops and priests, do not wish to be a ‘Catholic minority’ in their own homeland, whose voice does not exist or is not heard at all.” At the end of the celebration of the Mass, Nunico Einaudi and Archbishop Bozanić expressed their congratulations to the new bishop of the Đakovo and Srijem Diocese.
The newly ordained Auxiliary Bishop Đuro Hranić delivered an adderss and expressed his gratitude at the end of the Mass. Among other things, he pointed out how “personal credibility and enthusiasm, a heart filled with love and God is today the most successful evangelical-pastoral method.” He understood his bishop’s motto first of all as “a powerful invitation for personal conversion, and then to enthusiastic systematic work and evangelization, an invitation for the promotion of ecclesiology and spirituality, personalizing relationships in the Church; as well as an invitation for the recognition of various charisms and gifts that the Holy Spirit awakens among us, and the promotion of planned and coordinated work and cooperation of priests and lay believers; as an invitation to studious engagement in the pastoral problem of our cities, beginning from Osijek, the demolished and laboriously restored parishes, and the serious understanding of spiritual needs — especially families and attention to the expectations and prophetic dynamism that generations of our young people carry within themselves.” He also understands “put out into the deep” as an invitation “to all of us not to escape from the world, as an invitation to enter from our established customary habits and instutionalism into the public, cultural, educational, scientific, media, economic and political world of Slavonija, Baranja, Srijem and our entire Homeland, and convey the ethical and vertical dimensions of human life. All times are equally unsuitable and every culture is equally open and suitable for the proclamation of the Gospel.”
Following the ceremonies in the cathedral, a reception was prepared for the guests in the great hall of the Central Diocesan Library. Here the new auxiliary bishop greeted the president of the Croatian Parliament, Zlatko Tomičić, and the vice president of the Government of the Republic of Croatia and president of the Government Commission for Relations with Religious Communities, Dr. Goran Granić.
At the ordination. besides the Croatian bishops and archbishops, the participants included Archbishop Stanislav Hočevar of Belgrade, Bishop Metod Pirih of Kopar, Bishop Mihaljo Mayer of Pécs, Bishop Ivan Penzeć of Subotica, Bishop Ilija Janić of Kotor, Auxiliary Bishop Jožef Smej of Maribor, Auxiliary Bishop Pero Sudar of Sarajevo, and delegates from the Austrian Conference of Bishops, the bishop of Banja Luka and the bishop of Mostar. Serbian Orthodox Bishop Lukijan of Osijek-Poland and Baranja and Bishop Sava of Slavonija attended, as did Bishop Endre Langh of the Reformed Christian Church in the Republic of Croatia, and acting Bishop Andreas Lukša of the Evangelical Church of the Republic of Croatia.
In addition to numerous representatives of the local authorities, there were also distinguished figures from cultural life, including the president and vice president of the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences, Ivo Padovan and Milan Moguš.