Archbishop Emeritus
J. Michael Miller, CSB
Spiritual Director of Catholic Street Missionaries
Archbishop Emeritus J. Michael Miller, chief shepherd of Vancouver's 400,000 Catholics since January 2009, has been part of the city's religious landscape since 2007, when Pope Benedict XVI named him Coadjutor Archbishop.
Early Life & Education
Born in Ottawa in 1946, Archbishop Miller grew up in the nation's capital before attending the University of Toronto. He then entered the novitiate of the Basilian Fathers, making his first profession of vows in 1966. His original field of academic interest was Latin American studies, and he earned his Bachelor's Degree at the University of Toronto in 1969, followed by his Master's at the University of Wisconsin in 1970. After teaching high school for a year, he pursued his Master of Divinity at the University of St. Michael's College, Toronto, and then completed his Licentiate and Doctorate in theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome in 1979.
Ordination & Academic Career
In 1975, Pope Paul VI ordained him to the priesthood. Archbishop Miller joined the theology faculty at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas, in 1979 and subsequently served as chair of the Theology Department and dean of the School of Theology at St. Mary's Seminary. In 1990, he was named St. Thomas's vice president for academic affairs and in 1997 he became the University's president. From 1992 to 1997 he worked in Rome in the English-language Section at the Vatican's Secretariat of State.
Episcopal Appointment & Vatican Service
Pope John Paul II appointed him to the episcopacy in 2003, naming him Secretary of the Vatican's Congregation for Catholic Education. In addition to teaching theology in seminaries in the U.S., Mexico and Rome, Archbishop Miller has served on numerous boards of schools, universities, health care institutions, and numerous professional and public service organizations.
