The delicate and complex task of moving the lead-lined caskets took two days last week. 

A diocesan spokesperson said that for 30 years, the coffins had lain on shelves in the chapel adjoining the Narthex of St Michael and St John’s Cathedral, waiting for a crypt to be built underneath the building. 

However, due to the water lying under the building, and the resulting dampness, it is now highly unlikely a crypt will ever be built there. 

Hoists were used to remove the heavy coffins from their shelves, and then the caskets were lifted by crane for transport to the cemetery.

Bishops Joseph Patrick Byrne (1885-1901), John Dunne (1901-1919), Michael O’Farrell (1920-1928), John Francis Norton (1928-1963) and Albert Reuben Edward Thomas (1963-1983) have now been interred in the cemetery to the west of the Mortuary Chapel. 

Bishop Michael McKenna celebrated Mass for his predecessors on Monday July 20 in the cathedral, and on Wednesday July 23, Bishop McKenna blessed the new graves. 

Those bishops who served the community prior to Bishop Thomas’ term as the Bishop of Bathurst were all originally buried in Bathurst Cemetery. 

However, Bishop Thomas exhumed the bodies with the intention of placing them in a crypt under the cathedral along with his own body. 

Now it has become apparent that water under the cathedral is the cause of most of the current damage to the exterior and interior fabric of the cathedral.

Consequently, it was decided to reinter the bishops near their fellow priests and many religious sisters and brothers in the Catholic portion of the old cemetery. In the new year plaques will be erected over the bishops’ final resting places and at that time members of the community will be invited to be present for a blessing.