Maurice Taylor (5 May 1926 – 14 June 2023) was a British

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

bishop. He served as the Bishop of the

Diocese of Galloway The Diocese of Galloway was one of the thirteen (after 1633 fourteen) dioceses of the pre-1689 Scottish Church. The Diocese was led by the Bishop of Galloway and was centred on Whithorn Cathedral. In the Middle Ages, there was only one arc ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

from 1981 until 2004.

Early life

Born in

Hamilton Hamilton may refer to: * Alexander Hamilton (1755/1757–1804), first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States * ''Hamilton'' (musical), a 2015 Broadway musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda ** ''Hamilton'' (al ...

Lanarkshire Lanarkshire, also called the County of Lanark (; ), is a Counties of Scotland, historic county, Lieutenancy areas of Scotland, lieutenancy area and registration county in the Central Lowlands and Southern Uplands of Scotland. The county is no l ...

, he attended St Cuthbert's Primary, Burnbank, before going on to

St. Aloysius' College, Glasgow St Aloysius' College is a selective fee-paying, private, Jesuit day school in Glasgow, Scotland. It was founded in 1859 by the Jesuits, who previously staffed the college, and named after Saint Aloysius Gonzaga. St Aloysius' College is a co-ed ...

, and, later, Our Lady's High School, Motherwell. He studied

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

Blairs College St Mary's College, Blairs (commonly known as Blairs College), situated near Aberdeen in Scotland, was from 1829 to 1986 a junior seminary for boys and young men studying for the Priesthood (Catholic Church), Roman Catholic priesthood. Part o ...

, Kincardineshire, from 1942 to 1944 and then served in the

Royal Army Medical Corps The Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) was a specialist corps in the British Army which provided medical services to all Army personnel and their families, in war and in peace. On 15 November 2024, the corps was amalgamated with the Royal Army De ...

, at home, in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

and in

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

. He attended the Pontifical Scots College, Rome from 1947 to 1951, studying

theology Theology is the study of religious belief from a Religion, religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an Discipline (academia), academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itse ...

at the

Gregorian University Pontifical Gregorian University (; also known as the Gregorian or Gregoriana), is a private pontifical university in Rome, Italy. The Gregorian originated as a part of the Roman College, founded in 1551 by Ignatius of Loyola, and included all ...

and being ordained a priest in Rome on 2 July 1950. After a year as assistant priest in St Bartholomew's,

Coatbridge Coatbridge (, ) is a town in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, about east of Glasgow city centre, set in the central Lowlands. Along with neighbouring town Airdrie, North Lanarkshire, Airdrie, Coatbridge forms the area known as the Monklands (popula ...

, he returned to Rome in 1952 where he took his

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''doctor'', meaning "teacher") or doctoral degree is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism '' licentia docendi'' ("licence to teach ...

in theology in 1954. For 10 years from August 1955 he taught philosophy and theology at St Peter's College, Cardross.

Career

From 1965 until 1974 he was rector of the

Royal Scots College The Royal Scots College (Spanish: ''Real Colegio de Escoceses'') is a major seminary in Salamanca, Spain, for the Catholic Church in Scotland. It was located originally at Madrid, then Valladolid, and has been in Salamanca since 1988. History Th ...

Valladolid, Spain Valladolid ( ; ) is a Municipalities of Spain, municipality in Spain and the primary seat of government and ''de facto'' capital of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Castile and León. It is also the capital of the pr ...

. He was ordained

Bishop of Galloway The Bishop of Galloway, also called the Bishop of Whithorn, is the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Galloway, said to have been founded by Saint Ninian in the mid-5th century. The subsequent Anglo-Saxon bishopric was founded in the late 7 ...

by Cardinal Gordon Gray on 9 June 1981. For more than ten years he represented Scotland on the Episcopal Board of the

International Commission on English in the Liturgy The International Commission on English in the Liturgy (ICEL) is a commission set up by a number of episcopal conferences of English-speaking countries for the purpose of providing English translations of the liturgical books of the Roman Rite, ...

(ICEL), and was its chairman from 1997 until 2002. He retired as bishop in 2004 and was succeeded by John Cunningham. In 2013, it was revealed that Diocese priest Paul Moore had confessed to Taylor that he sexually abused a boy the year prior and that Taylor opted to send Moore to a treatment centre in Toronto and to Fort Augustus Abbey in the Highlands instead of turning him into the authorities. Taylor later cooperated during Moore's trial, which resulted in a conviction in 2018. Taylor died on 14 June 2023, at the age of 97.

Early life

Career

References

Further reading