As Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated Friday night with a Jubilee Mass at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark, New Jersey, Bishop Pedro Bismarck Chau will be standing at the alter. 

The newly-ordained Bishop Bismarck, as he likes to be called, is the first man born in Nicaragua to become a Catholic bishop in the United States. 

Journey to U.S. to escape danger started in 1983

Bismarck was born in Nicaragua in 1967 and lived through the Civil War, during which 50,000 people died. In 1983, he fled the danger, sneaking across the southern border into the U.S.

“There was fear in me as a young teenager, that I came at the age of 16 and started working, undocumented,” he said.

He said he came to America because he knew it was a land of opportunity.

“Many people do come escaping, seeking a better life. Escaping the danger,” he said.  

But Bismarck never dreamed his journey would lead to U.S. citizenship and a call to the priesthood at age 40. Then, in early September, he was installed as the first Nicaraguan-born bishop in the nation.  

“I’m so honored that God called me in the church of the United States, as a Latino, as an immigrant, as a Nicaragüense, to serve the people of the United States,” he said.

“I want to be the voice for those voiceless”

Bismarck will assist Joseph Cardinal Tobin administer the archdiocese, focusing on Hudson County and helping immigrants. He’s walked in their shoes and knows what it means to seek sanctuary.

“I want to be the voice for those voiceless. I want to be the voice of the church to tell them, ‘God is with you because we are with you,'” he said. “And I hope that those words mean something for them.”

He added, “We are the church. We need to be there for our people to let them know they are not alone. To help them with resources, connecting them with resources that they need.”

Bismarck’s elevation to bishop was a high honor that included a humble moment: lying on the ground in front of the altar for several minutes.

He said he was thinking to himself, “I want to ‘die to self.”

“That’s literally what that means when you are lying on the floor. You are just saying, ‘Lord, take me, that Bismarck dies and that You may live,'” he said.

A journey from fear to faith, from Nicaragua to Newark.