Archbishop-designate Jeffrey Grob headed to Milwaukee archdiocese

When Archbishop-designate Jeffrey Grob is installed as Archbishop of Milwaukee on Jan. 14, 2025, it will be a homecoming of sorts for the Wisconsin farm boy.

But it will also mean a farewell to the Archdiocese of Chicago, where Archbishop-designate Grob has served since he started at the University of St. Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary in 1989, three years before he was ordained a priest.

He was ordained an auxiliary bishop on Nov. 13, 2020, and has served as the episcopal vicar of Vicariate I, which includes some of northern Cook County and all of Lake County, directly adjacent to his new archdiocese.

Cardinal Cupich released a statement congratulating the archbishop-designate when the appointment was announced on Nov. 4.

“For more than 30 years, the Archdiocese of Chicago and the People of God have been the beneficiaries of Archbishop Jeffrey Grob’s compassion, scholarship and commitment to service,” Cardinal Cupich said. “Pope Francis has recognized Archbishop Grob’s extraordinary gifts and is returning him to his native state of Wisconsin as leader of the Milwaukee archdiocese. Our deep gratitude and prayers go with him as he continues to follow Jesus and bring grace to the fortunate people of his new archdiocese.”

Archbishop-elect Grob, 63, learned of his appointment on Oct. 15, when Cardinal Christophe Pierre called him as he was walking down a corridor in the Archbishop Quigley Center, where he was attending meetings.

He knew Cardinal Pierre was not calling just to pass the time, so he borrowed an unoccupied office to take the call, he said.

“It was one of those sobering moments, where I felt, ‘This is something,’” Archbishop-designate Grob said. “I was thinking back to Sept. 6, 2020, when he called me and said I was being appointed an auxiliary bishop. It’s one of the moments where the birds stop singing and the earth stops turning on its axis. It’s one of those frozen moments.”

After Cardinal Pierre told him that he had been appointed to the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, Archbishop-designate said he asked him to confirm it.

“I asked three times if he had the right name,” he said. “And each time, he said, ‘Yes, Grob, that’s it.’”

He is thankful for the support and welcome of Archbishop Jerome Listecki, who has led the Archdiocese of Milwaukee since 2010. Archbishop Listecki, 75, a Chicago native, was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago in 1975 and an auxiliary bishop in Chicago in 2000. Four years later, he was appointed bishop of La Crosse, Wisconsin, before being assigned to Milwaukee.

When Archbishop-designate Grob’s appointment was announced, Archbishop Listecki said, “Pope Francis has blessed the entire Southeastern Wisconsin community with his selection of Bishop Grob, whom I have known for years.”

Before becoming a bishop, Archbishop Listecki taught Archbishop-designate Grob moral theology at Mundelein, and on Nov. 4, as Archbishop Listecki introduced his successor to the Milwaukee media and various groups in his archdiocese, he also reassured Archbishop-designate Grob about his path forward.

“He just kept saying, ‘Jeff, be yourself and you’ll be fine,’” Archbishop-designate Grob said.

Archbishop Listecki has “borne the brunt of battle,” he added, seeing the Archdiocese of Milwaukee through bankruptcy and through many struggles related to clerical sexual abuse, and is retiring with an archdiocese that is “solidly grounded.”

While Archbishop-designate Grob grew up in Wisconsin, it was in the Diocese of Madison, on a farm in Cross Plains, where, he told Milwaukee media, he milked his family’s brown Swiss cows.

But he did spend time in the Milwaukee area, working for four years as an apprentice funeral director and embalmer in a Kenosha, Wisconsin, funeral home after his first year of theology studies. He spent that time in discernment, and then went to Mundelein when he returned to seminary.

In addition to his theology degrees, Archbishop-designate Grob holds two doctorates: one in philosophy from the University of Ottawa, and one in canon law, from St. Paul University in Ottawa, Ontario.

He served in parishes as resident and assistant pastor at Sts. Faith, Hope and Charity Parish, Winnetka, from 1992 to 1998, and as a weekend assistant at St. Basil Parish in Ottawa, Ontario, from 1998 to 2002, while he was studying. He was dean of Deanery IV-D from 2008 to 2009 and pastor of St. Celestine Parish in Elmwood Park from 2008 to 2013.

He has served the Archdiocese of Chicago in many, often simultaneous positions, including assistant chancellor, judge on the Court of Appeals, judicial vicar, chancellor, archbishop’s delegate to the Independent Review Board, archbishop’s liaison to lay ecclesial movements and new communities and judicial vicar and vicar for canonical affairs.

Even with his experience, he feels some trepidation about his new role.

“It’s that familiar image of trying to drink from a fire hose,” Archbishop-designate Grob joked. “I basically have care of Vicariate I here. Now I have 10 counties, or will have. … The learning curve for myself, going from auxiliary bishop to archbishop, and metropolitan — there are four suffragan dioceses. It’s the expanse of it all.”

Still, the archbishop-designate said, he never considered saying no, because this is what the Lord is calling him to.

“With all of the places I’ve been, and all of the circumstances, in spite of myself, God has brought me where I need to be,” he said. “I believe in that adage about God drawing straight with crooked lines. It’s not about me, and it can never be about me. It’s about our church, and it’s about our Lord, and it’s about the Truth — capital T-Truth, the Truth of our Lord.”