‘I would do everything to become a priest,’ Iceland’s Capuchin bishop says

ROME — The only Catholic bishop in Iceland, David Bartimej Tencer, is celebrating a double jubilee this year — the 40th anniversary of his priestly ordination and the Franciscan jubilee marking the 800th anniversary of the death of St. Francis of Assisi — as a member of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchins.

Looking back, he said, he feels great gratitude. Even if he had not become a priest, he “would do everything to become one,” the bishop of Reykjavik, the only diocese on the island, said in a conversation with EWTN News in Rome.

He was ordained in Slovakia, then communist Czechoslovakia, but “even if communism had not fallen, and thank God it did, a priest would still do what he was supposed to do,” he stressed. He had good priests in a seminary and in a parish who worked a lot and were able to eschew the imposed limits of the regime, the prelate explained.

The priests collaborated and were pastorally active, confessing and forming parishioners privately, outside the supervision of the state apparatus. Consequently, when the Iron Curtain fell in 1989, “an enormously powerful — or rather beautiful — Church arose in Slovakia,” Tencer told EWTN News.

“I am not just interested in what a priest does but in what he is — by transforming bread and wine,” the Slovak prelate explained.

Before he was ordained a bishop in 2015, he recalled it is “the fullness of priesthood and likeness to the Lord Jesus.”

He became a member of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchins in 1990. In the light of the current 800th anniversary of the death of St. Francis of Assisi, he said he sees the order’s spirituality “applicable everywhere, and we in Iceland appreciate it very much,” as it brings “the charism of the brotherhood.”

It “creates bridges and not barriers,” which is especially important on this island northwest of Europe, “as its nature and the way of life” constrain its inhabitants to be “very dependent on themselves,” Tencer said.

The bishop recently came to Rome to ordain a seminarian of Brazilian origin a deacon where he studies, one of the two seminarians in his diocese. The other one is a native Icelander who has been Catholic for seven years and came to faith through organ music, Tencer shared.

“He liked to listen to the organ and when he started going to the Catholic church, he saw that we use it as a means. We mostly do not go to concerts and listen to Bach, but it is simply an instrument for accompaniment during liturgy,” the bishop said, adding that the seminarian is now “a pretty good organist.”

Other Icelanders discover faith thanks to their spouse. For example, a Catholic Filipino woman might marry an evangelical Icelander. Since there is not much public transport in the country, he takes her to Mass by car and accompanies her also during the liturgy. “And so he also experiences the Catholic atmosphere,” the bishop of Reykjavik said.

Due to its small population of around 400,000, “a normal priest knows the majority of people by name.” People are very grateful, as this direct contact suits them very well, he clarified.

Interest in faith is rising

Yet the diocese does not just grab people and “make out of them some kind of Catholic so you do not even know what you have fallen into,” Tencer joked. Even for baptized Christians, the diocese requires that they experience Mass ideally every Sunday and spend the whole liturgical year with them.

“If they say no, it is OK, because we can live without them.”

The most beautiful thing about the Church in Iceland is that it does not impose but “offers,” he said.

When Tencer came to Reykjavik in 2015, the parish hall after Mass at the Reykjavik cathedral was always half full. The Icelanders who travel from great distances eat something and drink coffee after the liturgy to warm up. Nowadays, the hall and surrounding rooms are so full after Mass that he cannot find a place to sit.

“I am usually in the corridor where a few Indian fathers chat in their native Malayalam. It became their spot,” the Slovak bishop said, marking the rising number of Massgoers.

Regarding new ways to attract people, the Slovak bishop takes the example from communism when a priest would once a year on a given Sunday say: “If someone feels a calling to be a priest, go to the parish office.”

“When my school-leaving exam approached, I did,” he shared. The bishop was surprised no one did that in Iceland, so he took up this method.

“When I speak Icelandic in church, half of the congregation does not understand. If I speak English, another half does not understand. We are from 172 countries and are not united by culture or language.”

Yet it is not a reason to abstain from taking part in the liturgy, “since you go to a Mass to receive grace, not to understand the language,” Tencer clarified further.

“Even a blind person gets suntanned in the sun.”

Pope Leo XIV was a surprise in Iceland

Iceland sits between Europe and Greenland — a former Danish colony like Iceland was in the past. When geopolitical tensions arose over Greenland earlier this year, it did not create much stir in the society at large. People rather viewed it as a joke. “Anyway, who would be interested in us?” the bishop said jokingly, reminding that the Catholic community is overwhelmingly immigrant in a foreign land.

A few Greenlanders who are mostly fishermen in Iceland did not make a big deal out of it. However, the diocese has a fairly large group of Chaldeans, Syrians, and Ukrainian refugees, so when the problems hit Syria and Ukraine, “we felt for them and were afraid of their families in their homeland.”

The election of Pope Leo XIV was seen as “a very big surprise” in Iceland, he revealed. Since the Cathedral of Christ the King in Reykjavik will turn 100 in 2029, Tencer said he wants to invite the pope to visit the island on the occasion. The Holy Father usually sends papal legates for such occasions, but “if he came himself, that would be amazing for the local community,” the bishop said.

Iceland is part of the Nordic Bishops’ Conference together with Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. Bishops from these countries “are considered ours as if they were in one country,” Tencer said.

He was glad that fellow Nordic bishop Erik Varden of Trondheim, Norway, gave the Lenten spiritual exercises to the Roman Curia this year. They must have been “very lively and the cardinals were not bored,” Tencer said.

He also revealed that when Varden met Pope Francis, the Holy Father told him he had read his book. “Which one?” the prolific Norwegian author and prelate responded.

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