HYDERABAD: Bishop Anthony Poola, the Catholic Bishop of Kurnool diocese in Andhra Pradesh, has been appointed the Archbishop of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Hyderabad. Pope Francis, head of the Catholic Church, made the appointment here on Thursday. Bishop Poola, 59, will replace Archbishop Thumma Bala, who resigned after reaching the bishops’ canonical retirement age of 75 in April last year.
The appointment comes after Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Archbishop Thumma Bala of Hyderabad. Bishop Poola will now head the Hyderabad Archdiocese and also the ecclesiastical province of Hyderabad including the suffragan dioceses of Adilabad, Cuddapah, Khammam, Kurnool, Nalgonda and Warangal. Born in 1961 in Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh, Bishop Poola joined the minor seminary in Kurnool and then studied at St. Peter’s Pontifical Major Seminary, Bengaluru. He was ordained a priest in 1992 and later appointed as Bishop of Kurnool in February 2008. Since then, he has served the Telugu Catholic Bishops’ Conference in various capacities.
Archbishop Thumma Bala has served at the Hyderabad Archdiocese for nine years. Ordained a priest in December 1970 and appointed Bishop of Warangal in 1986, he was made the Archbishop in 2011.