BISHOP FREDERICK D’SOUZA WAS born on 4th Dec. 1934 in Diddakatte ,Mangalore Karnataka. He was born of Monte Maria Rebello and Sebastian D’Souza – who very generously offered all their eight children for the reign of God’s Kingdom. Thus we can say that Bishop belonged to good Catholic family. He had five brother priest, of whom one is our Bishop D’Souza , and two sisters who were nuns. His parents received a special reward from the Pope for offering all their children to work in the vineyard of the Lord. Their names go in an alphabetical order as: Fr. Anthony, Sr. Benedicta, Fr. Charles, Fr. Dominic, Sr. Evelyn, Bishop Frederick, Fr. George, & Sr. Hilda now God has taken the last surviving member of the family.

Born on: December 4, 1934

Parents Name:Mr. Sebastian & Mrs. Monte Mary D’Souza

Ordained Priest Jan 1, 1961 (Meerut)

Elected Bishop of Jhansi March 14, 1977

Ordained Bishop in Jhansi April 25th 1977

In 2002 Bishop had celebrated his Silver Jubilee of his Episcopal.

Bishop’s Golden Jubilee of his Priesthood on Jan 1st 2011.

Personalities:

He is very loving kind and caring person.

He has the credit of opening most of the mission stations in Jhansi.

He keeps his priests together by way of personal relationship and helping them in all the ways possible. He loves the seminarians very much and gives his due attention to him.

He had opened a lot of mission station and schools where even hardly we find any Catholics.

He is the person who is for the poor and does help them in his own way.

He is very simple and humble person and leads a very simple way of life.

He is the shepherd who is always for his sheep and loves to be one among them. And he is very much approachable person.

He is always in contact with the person through mails and e-mails.

Hobby is to read books and various magazines interested much in music. He is a Brother & friend to priests, father to seminarians and shepherd to the faithful, savior to the needy person.

1961 first appointment Dehradun as asst. Parish Priest.

1963 Viwerly Massorie as priest in charge.

1964 Back to Dehradun as priest in charge.

1965 Priest in charge of Bhekenpur Village Mission.

1966 – 1977 Parish priest and manager of the school of Cathedral of Meerut.

1977 Elected as Bishop of Jhansi.

1977 April 25th He was consecrated in Jhansi as the Bishop of Jhansi.

6th of January 2013 retired as the emeritus Bishop of Jhansi Coming to Jhansi and taking over from Bishop Baptist Murdartha was a strenuous job. He came to know that the Diocese is not sound economically. There were only 12 priests in the presbyterium and very few seminarians. There was no Minor seminary for the diocese. There were no personnel to work in 12 districts that was handed over to his Lordship to shepherd it. The largest parish was Sacred Heart Parish in Canttonment. There were few more stations like St. Anthony’s Cathedral Parish, St. John’s Premnagar, & Sipri Parish,Babina Church, Mahoba St. Joseph Parish, Lashkar St. John Baptist Church and Pakdilpur Church and Manikpur church. The flock was scattered and the priests were trained in the old fashioned parish priests. There was no youth ministry to take care of the youth of the diocese. No Hymns for the Daily Masses, Hindi Mass has not developed. Many of the youth were misguided and uneducated. Laity mainly depended on the parish priest for economical aid. In a situation where the new Bishop had to start from the scratch.

It was a great challenge to the new bishop who came from Meerut to learn the priest, visit the houses of the laity by parish visits and then pastoral visits. Bishop started recruiting candidates for priest hood who ever applied were promoted and encouraged to become priest in the diocese of Jhansi.

Bishop Frederick D’Souza started his journey by elevating the Shrine of St. Jude as the parish and appointed Rev. Fr. Augustine N.D. His first Vicar General as the Parish Priest of St. Jude’s Shrine and Fr. Peter Parapullil as assistant to Fr.Augustine. BHEL School was started and inaugurated in Khelar, Jhansi and Fr. Peter Selvanathan became the first Principal of BHEL School. Land at Morar was purchased by paying a big some of money and established St.Paul’s Church and St. Paul’s School started in Morar Gwalior with the help of Rev. Fr. George Chennat.

In 1980 He sent his priest to purchase a land in Banda District. a land in Banda to establish St. Mary’s School and St. Mary’s Church with the help of Fr. Sebastian Panakal. Soon after that He touched the district of Datia by establishing a mission station Holy Cross Ashram school with the help of Rev. Fr.Abraham Palakudy. His vision was to establish in all the districts a Tabernacle and erect a Cross amidst the people so that Christ’s presence may be known in the district.

His relentless endeavour and trust in the Lord and discernment helped him to complete in establishing institutions with huge investments in all the districts with in his service time and could hand over to his own priests a full fledged diocese with lots of activities going on all through for the service of the people of all religions.

I should make a special mention of his achievement in establishing a Sarva Dharma Samiti in Jhansi with all the religious leaders coming together to pray together and share together and think together to work in harmony and Peace. He was the head of the commission of Dialogue and ecumenism in the CCBI and CBCI for two or more terms. In all this periods, he worked relentlessly to have religious harmony and established human relationship with everyone,

In short from 11 priests and few mission stations Bishop Frederick has brought this diocese of Jhansi to nearly 45 mission stations and seventy priests and nearly 250 sisters in the diocese of Jhansi and created another diocese in Gwalior and gave priests and bishops for that diocese too. This is the life achievement in which he will be greatly rewarded by Almighty God. This is the work of the Lord and we shall praise the Almighty for what He has done in and through Bishop Frederick D’Souza.

Bishop submitted his resignation on the first week of December in 2009 when he completed 75years. It took three more years to get a successor to his episcopate in Jhansi. The successor was announced on 30th of October 2012. Bishop Peter Parapullil took over charge of the Diocese from him on 6th of January 2013. In April 2013 itself he moved to Vianney Bhavan which he had constructed when he was the Bishop of Jhansi.

Bishop was admitted to the diocesan St. Jude’s Hospital in a bad condition on 24th of June early morning. Doctors said he was not able to be shifted at present to any other hospital. 30th of June he was ready to be shifted and he was ready to go to Holy Family hospital in Delhi. He stood the journey by the ambulance with the assistance of a doctor and nurse to Holy Family Hospital. One year before he was there with the same doctors curing him and warning him that 80% of the lungs has undergone severe damage. He was advised to have oxygen cylinder always at stock in his room which he did without fail.

Doctors in the Holy Family Hospital wanted his co-operation to disinfect the lungs with antibiotics. Lungs was infected very badly and the Doctors continued their treatment hoping that they will help to disinfect the lungs and regain the good health of bishop Emeritus of Jhansi.

On 10th of July Bishop suffered a cardiac arrest with this cardiac arrest his health became worse and blood pressure could not be controlled. Doctors of Holy family tried their best but God wanted to take him to heaven on 12th afternoon at 8 O’Clock 2016. May his soul rest in peace.