Media Release
Darwin, Jan 10: Fr Prakash Brayan Menezes SVD, who is currently serving as the parish priest of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Parish in Alice Springs, was installed as the vicar-general of the Catholic diocese of Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia on November 19. The installation ceremony was led by Charles Victor Emmanuel Gauci, bishop of the Catholic diocese of Darwin and the Northern Territory in Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Parish in Alice Springs.
Fr Prakash who hails from Shirva, Udupi district had completed his SVD formation at Melbourne’s Dorish Maru College in 2014. Ever since, he has been assigned Central Australia for his mission. His first appointment was as assistant parish priest in Alice Springs, followed by parish priest at Catholic Church Santa Teresa, an Aboriginal community 90 kms from Alice Springs, before taking up the responsibility as the parish priest of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Parish, Alice Springs.
Darwin is the capital of Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT) where the Diocese is based. Alice Springs is a town in NT, the third largest settlement after Darwin and Palmerston. The catholic diocese of Darwin, established in 1938 is one of the largest dioceses in Australia covering an area of 1.5 million square kilometres. It consists of 20 parishes and boasts of a sizeable number of indigenous Australians as its parishioners.
As a parish priest, Fr Prakash has also been serving as the episcopal vicar for the southern part of the diocese in Central Australia. The new responsibility of vicar-general of the diocese is on top of continuing in his role as a parish priest of Sacred Heart Parish in Alice Springs. Fr Prakash will be visiting the diocesan headquarters in Darwin whenever warranted in fulfilment of his duties.
Fr Prakash takes over the role from Malcolm Fyfe MSC who has been the vicar general of the diocese for 11 years, who has since retired.
Fr Prakash is an avid reader, an excellent singer and loves travelling among other things. He has been the main celebrant at Melbourne Konkan Community’s (MKC) Monthi Feast celebrations since the last few years.