(ANS - Rome) - Fr Ivo Coelho has been elected by the 27th General Chapter as new Councillor General for Formation. Fr Coelho is Rector of the Salesian Theological Centre at Ratisbonne in Jerusalem. He is not a member of the present Chapter.
When the voting ended Fr Coelho had received a large majority. The Rector Major immediately contacted him by telephone to ask if he accepted the result of the election. Fr Coelho responded positively and the Chapter members, who had been following the phone call, applauded. Fr Coelho said, "I accept the will of the Chapter and see here the will of God for me and for the Congregation. I hope to do my best, with God’s grace and your help, and that of Don Bosco and Mary Help of Christians."
Nicholas Ivo Coelho was born on 15 October 1958 in Mumbai, India. He entered the Salesian novitiate of Yercaud in 1976, made his first profession on 24 May 1977 in the same city, and his perpetual profession exactly 7 years later in Mumbai. He was ordained priest on 27 December 1987 at Panjim.
He studied philosophy at the Pontifical University Jnana- Deepa Vidyapeeth of Pune and Theology at the Kristu Jyoti College in Bangalore. In 1994 he obtained a doctorate in philosophy at the Gregorian University in Rome with a thesis on the thought of the Canadian theologian, Bernard Lonergan. His doctoral thesis was entitled: "The development of the notion of universal point of view in the thought of Bernard Lonergan: from Insight to Method in Theology."
That same year he was appointed Rector of the student community of Nashik, a role he filled until 2001 and then again from 2008 to 2011. He served as Provincial of India - Mumbai in the intervening years.
In 2007 and 2008 he was part of the Pre-Chapter Commission for the 26th General Chapter in which he participated and acted as moderator. In 2011 he took up the appointment as Rector of the Salesian Theological Centre in Jerusalem.
Fr Coelho succeeds Fr Francis Cereda, who was elected yesterday as Vicar of the Rector Major.
Posted on 27/03/2014
