Bernd Wallet

Bernd Wallet serves as the 84th Archbishop of Utrecht of the Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands. Elected on 15 February 2020, he was consecrated on 18 September 2021, after two delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Life and career

The son of a pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church, Wallet converted to Old Catholicism and completed his theological studies at the University of Hull in 2005 and from the Old Catholic Seminary in Amersfoort in 2006. He was ordained a deacon in 2006 by Archbishop John Sentamu of the Anglican Diocese of York. One year later, he was ordained a priest by Archbishop Joris Vercammen at St. Gertrude Cathedral in Utrecht.

From 2007 to 2010, Wallet served as assistant curate in Northallerton, in the Diocese of York. Upon his return to the Netherlands, he served as personal assistant to Archbishop Vercammen, responsible for external relations with other Old Catholic Churches of the Union of Utrecht and the Anglican Church.

Wallet served as pastor of St. Gertrude Cathedral in Utrecht from 2015 to 2020. On 15 February 2020, he was elected Archbishop of Utrecht by the Cathedral Chapter of Utrecht. At that time, he shared, "I want to challenge our parishes to be open houses for those in their areas...We must continue to be open to society and testify with joy to the hope that is in us."

His episcopal consecration was first scheduled for 21 June, but postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. On 23 October 2020, the Metropolitan Chapter of Utrecht announced that the consecration, which had been scheduled for 7 November 2020 (the Feast of St Willibrord, the first bishop of Utrecht), had to be cancelled a second time. He was eventually consecrated as a bishop on 18 September 2021 in the Lebuïnuskerk in Deventer by Old Catholic bishop Dirk Schoon, with bishops Matthias Ring (Catholic Diocese of the Old-Catholics in Germany) and Robert Innes (Church of England) acting as co-consecrators; bishops of the Church of England, the Episcopal Church, and the Church of Sweden participated in the consecration as well, while the Catholic Church, the Protestant Church of the Netherlands and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople send some delegates without taking part in the ceremony. He was enthroned on the following day in St. Gertrude's Cathedral in Utrecht.

Wallet is married and has children.

References

1. Union of Utrecht (Old Catholic)
2. Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands
3. Old Catholic Archdiocese of Utrecht
4. Sixteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops
5. List of current Christian leaders
6. Joris Vercammen
7. List of bishops and archbishops of Utrecht
8. International Old Catholic Bishops' Conference
9. Citibank United Arab Emirates
10. Corky of Gasoline Alley
11. List of solved missing person cases: pre-2000
12. Axie Infinity
13. Gasoline Alley (1951 film)
14. The Catcher in the Rye
15. 1937 Pattern Web Equipment
16. Detectorists
17. List of unsolved murders in Canada
18. Gilgo Beach serial killings
19. Miranda (TV series)
20. The Humans (video game)