His Beatitude Youssef (Joseph) Absi
Melkite Greek Catholic Patriarch of Antioch and All the East
Bishop Francois Beyrouti
Bishop of the Eparchy of Newton
Bishop Francois Beyrouti (born July 3, 1971) is a Lebanese-born bishop of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church and serves as eparch for the Eparchy of Newton.
Early Life
Beyrouti was born on 3 July 1971, one of three children born to Elias and Maggy Beyrouti in Hadath-Beirut, Lebanon. After emigrating with his family in 1976 to North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, he attended the Saint Thomas Aquinas Catholic High School.
Priesthood
From 1989 to 1993, he studied at the Christ the King Seminary in Mission, B.C. He was awarded a degree and doctorate in biblical theology from Saint Paul University, Ottawa, Ontario. On October 4, 1998, Beyrouti was ordained to the priesthood for the eparchy of Saint-Sauveur de Montréal of the Greek Melkites. From his ordination to January 31, 2010, Fr. Beyrouti served as pastor of Sts. Peter and Paul Melkite Catholic Church in Ottawa. He was incardinated into the Melkite Greek Catholic Eparchy of Newton and served as pastor at Holy Cross Melkite Catholic Church until his election and consecration as bishop on June 23 2022.
Episcopal Career
Pope Francis appointed Beyrouti eparch for the Eparchy of Newton on August 20, 2022. On October 12, 2022, Beyrouti was consecrated bishop, and on October 19, 2022, was installed as the eparchial bishop.
About Fr. Mallick
Born to Fred and Jean Mallick in 1972, Fr. Mallick is a native of Ft. Worth. His mother fell asleep in the Lord on January 7, 2016. He has two living siblings and one deceased brother. Both of his living siblings are married, with a total of seven children. He was a parishioner of St. Andrew Catholic Parish and attended its elementary school. He later became a parishioner of St. Patrick Cathedral. He is a member of Monsignor Nolan Catholic High School’s 1991 graduating class.
Fr. Mallick earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts at Magdalen College in NH, immediately followed by his theological and seminary formation. His formation included two years as a missionary in a religious society while living in Mexico and Spain, followed by two years in a Benedictine monastery in Italy, which became the Nursia foundation in the year A.D. 2000. In the spring of 2000, Fr. Mallick returned to the United States and moved to Denver, CO where he taught at a Catholic Academy. The following year, Archbishop Charles Chaput received him as a seminarian for the Archdiocese of Denver. Father Mallick completed his priestly formation at Saint John Vianney Theological Seminary, where he earned his S.T.B. and M. Div. degrees. He was ordained to the Holy Priesthood of Jesus Christ on December 3, 2005. He served three years as a parochial vicar at St. Thomas More Catholic Parish in Centennial, CO and seven years as pastor of Sacred Heart of Mary Catholic Parish in Boulder, CO. In 2015, Fr. Mallick was granted a sabbatical to pursue a Master of Arts in Liturgical Studies at the Mundelein Liturgical Institute outside of Chicago.
The last few years have allowed Fr. Mallick to explore, experience, and learn more about his own Lebanese heritage and that of the Antiochian Church – Father Mallick’s Church of origin. The more familiar it became to him, the more he desired it. While Father Mallick has travelled to many countries on pilgrimage and vacation, Lebanon and Israel top the list for him. He loves his Middle Eastern heritage. In fact, it was a month-long blessed trip to Lebanon during Great Lent and Holy Pascha of 2019 that solidified his decision to begin steps to change his affiliation – to move from the Latin Church to the Antiochian Church. In October 2019, Father Mallick petitioned the Archbishop of Denver to excardinate, and he petitioned Bishop Samra of the Newton Eparchy to incardinate. Both bishops have agreed to a five-year ad experimentum that began in June 2020.
Currently, Father Mallick is the primary caregiver of his father and leads a high-school junior and senior seminar on the Nature of Man as he continues to form a Melkite Community in the DFW metroplex.
Fr. Mallick’s interests: his Lebanese heritage, liturgy, singing (having produced four CDs), reading, history, cooking, chess, gardening, travelling, movies, and playing the classical guitar. He has led several pilgrimages to various shrines and countries, including Israel, Poland, Germany, Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, France, Ireland, Greece, Spain, and Turkey.
Books that have influenced greatly the heart of Fr. Mallick:
- The Holy Bible,
- He Leadeth Me,
- Man’s Search for Meaning,
- Wind Sand and Stars,
- Eucharist,
- For the life of the World
- and the Brothers of Karamazov.
Authors for which he has great affection:
- Benedict XVI,
- Fr. Alexander Schmemann,
- Robert Cardinal Sarah,
- Ven. Fulton J. Sheen,
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky,
- Matthew the Poor,
- and Flannery O’Conner.
Saints dear to Father’s heart:
- the Blessed Mother,
- Saint Joseph,
- Saint Peter the Apostle,
- Saint Paul the Apostle,
- Saint Mark the Evangelist,
- Saint Augustine,
- Saint John Chrysostom,
- Saint Basil the Great,
- Saint Gregory Nazianzus,
- Saint Leo the Great,
- Saint Maximus the Confessor,
- Saint Charbel,
- Saint Mary of Egypt,
- Saint Photini,
- and Saint Benedict.
Brief Family history
All eight of Father Mallick’s great-grandparents immigrated to the United States in the 1880s-90s. Two of his great-grandfathers were Malouff/Mallouf – various English spellings of the same family. Both emigrated from Zahle. His great-grandfather Richard Malouff settled in southern Colorado and married Malek (Queenie) Shadid from Wichita. She had emigrated from Marjayoun. Nicholas Mallouf settled in Oklahoma and married Amini (Minnie) Jabalie, who also emigrated from Zahle. Another of his great-grandfathers was Fred Hraiz – anglicized to Harris. Fred Harris emigrated from Zahle and settled in Oklahoma before moving to CO. In Colorado, he married Nazera Fikani, who also had emigrated from Zahle. His great-grandfather Abraham Mallick emigrated from a village in southern Lebanon called Rashaya. He settled in Fort Worth, Texas, and married Edna Waken, another immigrant from Zahle.