Persona

Michael Deeb

1953-

Michael Deeb was born in Welkom in the Free State Province of South Africa in 1953. After completing Secondary School Matriculation at Christian Brothers College in Boksburg he studied at Wits University, where he graduated in Psychology in 1979. Mike did his honours in Religious Studies at the University of Cape Town in 1985 and received his Masters Degree in Theology at The University of Natal in 2000. For a major part of his life he has worked with secondary and university student movements, particularly with those of Catholic students, and with youth in general. Mike was a founding member of the Young Christian Students (YCS) in South Africa, and has been involved in many other Catholic structures of youth, laity, and Justice and Peace. He was also active in Theology Exchange Programme in Cape Town and the Institute for Contextual Theology (ICT) in Johannesburg. Mike Deeb entered the Dominican Order in 1986 and, after his ordination as a priest in 1991, he worked for several years in poor rural parishes in the central Free State. In 1999 he was appointed by the Vatican Secretariat of State to be the International Chaplain of the international Catholic student movements, the International Movement of Catholic Students (IMCS-Pax Romana) and the International Young Catholic Students (IYCS). This position required him to move to the headquarters in Paris in France, where he worked for 8 years. His duties included: coordinating, visiting and animating Catholic student movements in nearly 100 countries in all regions of the world, and doing global advocacy on their behalf in the international institutions and in the church. In 2008 after his return to South Africa, Mike was appointed to be the Coordinator of the Justice and Peace Department of the Southern African Catholic Bishops' Conference (SACBC). He served in this position for 6 years, promoting Justice and Peace structures and formation amongst the bishops, priests and laity in the 29 dioceses of the SACBC while coordinating the department's advocacy efforts to confront injustices at national and local levels. In 2011 Mike Deeb was elected to be the Promoter for Justice and Peace and the Dominican Family in Africa. Year later (2012) he was appointed to be the Promoter for Justice and peace of the Dominicans in Southern Africa. In 2014 Mike was appointed by the Master of the Order to be the Permanent Delegate of the Dominican Order to the United Nations. This position required of him to move to Rome, where he is engaging with the UN in its several centers with a particular focus on Geneva. Mike also became the Dominican's Order General Promoter for Justice and Peace.