Ratko Perić

The Most Reverend Ratko Perić
Bishop of Mostar-Duvno and Apostolic Administrator of Trebinje-Mrkan
Province	Sarajevo
Diocese	Mostar-Duvno Trebinje-Mrkan
See	Mostar
Appointed	24 July 1993
Predecessor	Pavao Žanić
Orders
Ordination	29 June 1969 by Petar Čule
Consecration	14 September 1992 by Franjo Kuharić
Personal details
Born	(1944-02-02) 2 February 1944 Tuk, Rovišće, FS Croatia, DF Yugoslavia
Nationality	Croat
Denomination	Roman Catholic
Residence	Mostar
Alma mater	Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb; Pontifical Urban University
Motto	Kroz nevolje u kraljevstvo Božje
Coat of arms	Ratko Perić's coat of arms

Mons Ratko Perić (born February 2, 1944) is the current Bishop of Mostar-Duvno and Apostolic Administrator of Trebinje-Mrkan.

Life

Ratko Perić was born in the village of Tuk in the Rovišće municipality, near Bjelovar in Croatia. After studies in Zagreb and Rome, he was ordained priest on 29 June 1969 in Prisoje. He received doctorate from the Pontifical Urbaniana University in 1971, and then taught at Catholic seminaries in Sarajevo, Zagreb, and for several years at the Gregoriana in Rome. He was rector of the Pontifical Croatian College of St. Jerome in Rome, 1980 - 1992. He is fluent in Italian, German and English.

Bishop

In May 1992 Pope John Paul II named him coadjutor bishop of Mostar-Duvno. Since the Mostar Cathedral was heavily damaged in the ongoing war, Bishop Perić's consecration took place in Neum, on 14 September 1992. He was consecrated by Franjo Cardinal Kuharić, Archbishop of Zagreb, assisted by Archbishop Josip Uhač, secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and Pavao Žanić, bishop of Mostar-Duvno.

During the 1992 - 1995 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina there were about 1000 Catholic properties destroyed (churches, monasteries, parish houses and other church buildings).

Following Bishop Žanić's retirement, Bishop Perić succeeded him as Bishop of Mostar-Duvno on 24 July 1993. He is also the permanent apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Trebinje-Mrkan.

Romanis Pontificibus

In June 1975, in order to settle jurisdictional disputes between the Franciscan Province of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Diocese, Pope Paul VI issued a decree, Romanis Pontificibus, specifying which parishes the friars could retain and which were to be turned over to be administered by diocesan clergy. By 1980 the friars had still not relinquished ten named parishes. As coadjutor, Ratko assisted Bishop Žanić in attempting to implement the decree. The parties were still working on full implementation as late as December 1998, when a joint statement was issued by the Most Revd. Archbishop Marcello Zago, OMI, Secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, Franciscan Minister General, Brother Giacomo Bini, and Bishop Perić, which read in part, "The Holy See and the Order intend to keep informed regarding the progress of the transfer. Any friars who disobey should know that they incur the penalties envisaged in the laws of the Church and of the Order."

In 2003 Pope John Paul II asked the members of the General Chapter of the Franciscan Order to carry into effect the decision of his predecessor, Pope Paul VI, going back to 1975.

On April 2, 1995, at the high point of conflict within the local diocese, Bishop Perić was kidnapped by Herzegovinian Croatian militiamen (HVO), beaten, and taken to a chapel run by one of the Franciscans associated with Medjugorje, where he was held hostage for ten hours. At the initiative of the mayor of Mostar he was freed without bloodshed, with the help of the United Nations Protection Force.

Post-War reconstruction

According to Helen Walasek, Bishop Perić supported the actions of local authorities to "pursue their policy of cultural and ethnic exclusivism." Permits to rebuild the Čaršija Mosque were denied despite a warning from the OHR Senior High Deputy Representative. In the spring of 2001, Perić promoted the notion that the location was the site of an earlier Christian structure and required important archeological investigation.

Gorana Ognjenović identifies Perić as leading a group of Catholic priests who justify the demolition of mosques and call for churches to be built on the ruins. On April 15, 2015 Bishop Perić handed a memorandum to the President of the Republic of Croatia pointing out that in areas predominantly inhabited by Serbs, institutions, banks, school, cultural and public health bodies should be controlled by Croats.

Medjugorje

Perić is, like his predecessor, opposed to the alleged Marian apparitions of Medjugorje. Bishop Perić wrote a personal letter declaring his position to be that nothing supernatural was occurring in Medjugorje (the third designation). But in order not to lead the faithful into believing that his statement was an official Church position, Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone, the Secretary to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that was presided over at the time by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, wrote in a letter to the bishop of Saint-Denis-de-La Réunion that "what Bishop Perić said in his letter … is and remains his personal opinion."

See also

• Roman Catholicism in Bosnia and Herzegovina