Infanta bishop is Pope Leo’s first Filipino appointee
LUCENA CITY—Pope Leo XIV has named Fr. Dave Dean Capucao the new bishop for the Prelature of Infanta.
This makes Capucao, who started as a village pastor in the 1990s, the new Pontiff’s first Filipino appointee.
The 59-year-old priest is the fifth bishop of the prelature, according to the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) News, the official news service of the CBCP. It was headed since 2015 by Bishop Bernardino Cortez, whom Capucao succeeded with Cortez’s retirement.
The prelature covers Aurora province and the northern part of Quezon province.
Studies in Europe
“With grateful hearts, we solemnly announce and give thanks to the Lord for the appointment of the new shepherd of the Prelature of Infanta,” the office said on its Facebook page on Friday.
The new bishop was ordained a priest for the Infanta prelature on Oct. 3, 1994. He was then appointed founding pastor of a village parish in a poor area in Aurora where he served for six years.
In 2000, Capucao studied intercultural and interreligious theology at the Catholic University of Nijmegen (now Radboud University) in the Netherlands, earning a master’s degree in 2002.
He holds a doctorate in sacred theology from the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium.
He returned to the Philippines in 2011 as a formator at St. Joseph Formation House in Quezon City, becoming rector in 2015.
In 2021, he was appointed superintendent of the Catholic Association of Schools in the Infanta prelature.
Capucao is the president of the Center for Empirical Studies on Spirituality, Theology and Religion-Asia and a member of the prelature’s Presbyteral Council and other international organizations.
