Pope Francis Oct. 29 appointed Father Kurt Burnette, rector of Sts. Cyril and Methodius Seminary in Pittsburgh, to head the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Passaic, N.J.
The diocese covers Byzantine and Ruthenian Catholics living in New England and on the East Coast.
Bishop-designate Burnette succeeds Archbishop William C. Skurla, who headed the eparchy until he was appointed to head the Byzantine Catholic Archeparchy of Pittsburgh in January 2012. His enthronement as metropolitan was in April of that year. Father Edward G. Cimbala has been administrator of the Passaic Eparchy in the interim.
The newly named bishop will be enthroned Dec. 4 at St. Michael the Archangel Cathedral in Passaic.
Bishop-designate Burnette, who has been rector of the Pittsburgh seminary since October 2012, was born in England in 1955. He was ordained a priest at St. Mary Cathedral in Sherman Oaks, Calif., for the Holy Mary of Protection Byzantine Eparchy of Phoenix April 26, 1989, by the late Bishop John M. Bilock.
He was pastor at several parishes including St Nicholas of Myra in Fontana, Calif.; St. Irene the Virgin and Great Martyr in Portland, Ore.; St. Gabriel the Archangel in Las Vegas; and Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Albuquerque, N.M.
He also served as chaplain for the Fontana Police Department and regularly visited jails and prisons in California, Oregon, Washington and New Mexico. He served his eparchy as “economos,” or financial administrator, and consultor from 1991 till 1994.
He served as tribunal official for his own eparchy, and also for the Archdiocese of Santa Fe, N.M., the Diocese of Phoenix, and the Diocese of Gallup, N.M.
Bishop-designate Burnette has a doctorate in mathematics from the University of Utah and taught mathematics, engineering, physics, and computer science from 1978 until 2004 at that university and also at the University of California at Irvine, California State University at San Bernardino and the University of Portland, where he led one of the first classes in the world on quantum computing.
He is a member of the California Bar Association and has a licentiate in canon law from the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome.
Born at Sculthorpe Royal Air Force Base in Norfolk, England, Bishop-designate Burnette grew up in Texas — Corpus Christi and Houston. He has two sisters and a brother, and nine nephews and nieces. His father is from Los Angeles and his mother is from Marietta, Ohio. His parents live in Corpus Christi.
The Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Passaic stretches the entire length of the East Coast, from Maine to Florida, encompassing 16 states, as well as eastern Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia.
The eparchy has 14,356 parishioners and 77 priests in 84 parishes. – CNS