Peter Leslie Smith


Peter Leslie Smith is a South African-born Catholic bishop in the United States. Since 2014 he has served as the auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon.

Early life

Smith was born in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, on February 8, 1958, and was educated in the local schools. He earned a bachelor's degree and a law degree from the University of Natal in South Africa. He immigrated to the United States in 1986. Smith received a master of divinity degree from Mount Angel Seminary in Saint Benedict, Oregon, and a bachelor in sacred theology from Pontifical Atheneum of St. Anselm in Rome. He was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Portland on June 9, 2001, by Archbishop John Vlazny.

Priest

After ordination, Smith served as the parochial vicar at Our Lady of the Lake Parish in Lake Oswego, Oregon from 2001 to 2004. He took a leave of absence from the archdiocese to study at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. where he received a licentiate in canon law in 2006. From 2006 to 2013 he served as the pastor St. Rose of Lima Parish in Portland, Oregon. Smith served as the adjutant judicial vicar from 2010 to 2014 and served as the Vicar General and Moderator of the Curia for the Archdiocese of Portland starting in 2013. He served as the archdiocesan liaison for the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, and he is a member of the Brotherhood of the People of Praise Community, a charismatic association of evangelical Catholics whose priest-members are incardinated in the Archdiocese of Portland.

Episcopacy

Auxiliary Bishop of Portland

named Smith the Titular Bishop of Tubunae in Mauretania and Auxiliary Bishop of Portland on March 4, 2014. He was ordained in St. Mary's Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Portland on April 29, 2014, by Archbishop Alexander Sample. Archbishop Emeritus John Vlazny of Portland and Bishop Liam Cary of Baker were the principal co-consecrators. Upon his election, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests released a statement expressing disappointment about the appointment as "another civil and canonical lawyer".