Scottish Catholic Observer

Mgr Smith (above) will become an attaché at the New York office where the Holy See has UN Permanent Observer Status. He will take up his new appointment at the beginning of March.

Archbishop Mario Conti paid tribute to the departing priest.

“Mgr Smith has served with great dedication as vice chancellor and then chancellor of the archdiocese for almost 25 years,” the archbishop said. “I have benefited greatly from his support. We cannot do better than to agree to the appointment of Mgr Peter as attaché, even if it means losing him for a while from the active service of the archdiocese.”

Mgr Smith said he was excited to take on the new challenge,

“Offers like this have come across the archbishop’s desk from time to time,” he said.

“And this one did look particularly interesting, I did my Masters in canon law in the States and New York is a city I know well so, after meeting with the nuncio at the United Nations (Archbishop Francis Chullikatt), and discussing it with Archbishop Conti, I decided to accept.”

He believes that in some ways his new role will not be that different from his current one.

“The biggest part of it will be administrating the archbishop’s office much as I do here in Glasgow,” he said. “Though there will also be some work on case studies and raising awareness of the issues of particular interest to the Church.”

To that end, he said, he is interested in areas such as ‘human rights, human dignity, education, homelessness and hunger.’

“These are all issues that the average Christian is rightly concerned about,” he added. “And if the United Nations is to grow and develop into a real force for good in the world, the Church has to be there working real hard on these things.”

Mgr Smith said it will be a ‘wrench’ to leave behind Glasgow, where he has served in parishes across the archdiocese. He said he would particularly miss the East End, where he was based as parish priest at St Mary’s and served earlier being an assistant priest at St Anne’s, Denniston.

“I’ve also been in the office of the Glasgow Archdiocese for 25 years but people do get new jobs all the time so I don’t expect to be crushed!” he said.

Fr Tom White will succeed Mgr Smith as chancellor, as parish priest of St Mary’s and as archdiocesan master of ceremonies. Mgr Smith paid tribute to him.

“I am delighted that Fr Tom has been appointed to succeed me in the various roles I vacate,” he said. “And I am grateful to the archbishop for releasing me from the archdiocese for a while to take up this new post.”

PIC: PAUL McSHERRY

Editor’s note: In the January 27 print edition of The Scottish Catholic Observer the name of the nuncio in this story is incorrect. This is the SCO’s error, not Mgr Smith’s