Bishop of Our Lady of Deliverance in the United States (Syrian)
Yousif Habash was born on June 1, 1951, in Qaraqosh, Iraq—within the Archeparchy of Mosul—into a Syriac-Catholic family. He entered the Dominican Fathers' Saint John Seminary in Mosul in 1965, later transferring to the Charfet Seminary in Lebanon in 1972. He completed his philosophical and theological studies at the Pontifical University of the Holy Spirit (USEK) in Kaslik, Lebanon. He was ordained a priest on August 31, 1975, and exercised his parish ministry in Qaraqosh. In 1983, he was appointed assistant pastor and subsequently pastor of the Sacred Heart (Sacré Cœur) parish in Basra, in southern Iraq. In 1994, he was sent to the United States to serve the pastoral needs of Syriac-Catholic the faithful at the Mission of Our Lady of Deliverance in Newark, New Jersey, and later in Chicago, Illinois; from 2001, he served as pastor of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Syriac-Catholic Parish in Los Angeles, California. He speaks Syriac, Arabic, French, English, and Hebrew.