2025 Leadership Team Nominees
At the AUSCP Assembly in San Antonio, three members will be elected to serve on the Leadership Team (LT) for a 3-year term. The following AUSCP members have agreed to be candidates: Greg Barras, Diocese of Biloxi, Fr. Mike Bausch, Diocese of Rochester, Fr. Joe Graffis, Archdiocese of Louisville, and Fr. Bernie Survil, Diocese of Greensburg. Three of our nominees served on the Leadership Team in previous years: Greg Barras and Mike Bausch served 2018-2024. Bernie Survil, a Founding Father, served 2011-2017, and 2022-2025.
New on our list of nominees is Joe Graffis. Joe, ordained in 1971, has served in various roles in the Archdiocese of Louisville, advocating for children and promoting Catholic education. He has had a lifelong commitment to Christian unity, influenced by his family and ecumenical experiences in seminary and ministry. He has been involved in adult catechetical teaching ministry and in the diaconate program along with many ecumenical and interfaith dialogue groups. He was one of the founding pastors of Louisville’s ecumenical/interfaith community organizing social justice coalition (CLOUT, Citizens of Louisville Organized & United Together).
Greg has a passion for implementing Vatican II and a commitment to synodality. He says: “The spirit of aggiornamento is vital and life giving to our building the Kingdom. My inspiration is working for the common good. AUSCP seeks the health of priests in order to serve the Kingdom. This is simple and so vital in today’s world. Volunteering in our local soup kitchen, Loaves and Fishes, enables me to serve the poor and marginalized in our area and stand in solidarity with them as they are shunned by our society. I seek to serve AUSCP, its vision and mission, because I believe it is vital in our Church and world today.”
Mike served as a pastor for 33 years in three different parishes. He says: “My operating style was the empowerment of the laity and staff members, which worked successfully. In the last parish, I was asked to develop an adult spiritual formation program. With the support of parishioners and staff, we developed a vibrant spiritual formation program. We offered a variety of formation opportunities, including the 19th Annotation (Ignatian Retreat in Daily Life) and the JustFaith Program. Both contributed to a vibrant social ministry program which includes a community garden and missions in Kentucky, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua. I believe to be a successful leader means working with others to develop a plan and empower people to make it happen.”
Bernie is a member of the AUSCP Gospel Nonviolence Working Group which authored and promoted The Eucharist of Gospel Nonviolence. If elected, he says: “I will strive to encourage the LT to keep alive the teachings of Vatican II that attracted over 1,000 priests to become members, and will urge the AUSCP — as a priority for the next 3 years — to lift up the legacy of Pope Francis who has done so much to revitalize the vision of Vatican II through a synodal process, his formal teachings (Fratelli Tutti, Laudate Si, etc.), and his pastoral style with which we ‘parish’ priests so easily identify.”
We are grateful to these AUSCP members for their willingness to serve on the Leadership Team. Nominations from the floor will also be invited during the Assembly.
Leadership Team members who have served a 3-year term and are not running for re-election are Fr. Peter Murray, SJ, and Fr. Tim Taugher, Diocese of Syracuse. Thank you, Peter and Tim, for the dedication of time and energy you put into serving on the LT over these past three years. Others who are continuing to serve on the LT are: Louie Arceneaux, CM, Kwame Assenyoh (Diocese of Oakland), Robert Lisowski, CSC, Jeffery Ott, OP, Neil Pezzulo, GHM, Donna Doucette, and Sarah Probst-Miller.