David Konderla

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David Austin Konderla is an American Catholic bishop who has led the Diocese of Tulsa in Oklahoma since 2016. He was born on June 3, 1960, in Bryan, Texas, the second of twelve children. After high school, he worked as a machinist before entering the priesthood.

Konderla studied at Holy Trinity Seminary in Irving, Texas, and earned a Master of Divinity from St. Mary’s Seminary at the University of St. Thomas in Houston in 1989. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Austin on June 3, 1991. He served as parochial vicar at several Texas parishes, became vocations director, and later was pastor and director of campus ministry at Texas A&M for about 11 years.

Pope Francis appointed him bishop of Tulsa on May 13, 2016, and he was consecrated on June 29, 2016, at the University of Tulsa. Since then, he has issued letters and statements on evangelization, church teaching, and social issues, reflecting a focus on orthodox teaching, social concern, and civic engagement.

Highlights of his leadership include a 2018 pastoral letter on evangelization, the 2019 disclosure of clergy abuse accusations in the diocese, and guidance during the COVID-19 pandemic, when Masses were suspended to protect the community. In 2020, he supported vaccine development but raised questions about fetal cell lines. After George Floyd’s death, he spoke against racism and held listening sessions on racial justice.

In 2021 he released a pastoral letter on the Eucharist and began annual Eucharistic revival events. He also supported school-choice measures before the Oklahoma Legislature. In 2022 he joined a vigil against an execution and supported the bishops’ response to the Synod on Synodality, while upholding traditional Catholic teaching on marriage. In 2023 he cautioned against gender-affirming care for minors and critiqued changes to Title IX that he felt affected religious liberty in schools. In 2024 he issued Stewards of Creation: A Call to Ecological Conversion, tying Catholic teaching to local environmental issues and urging parishes to act on creation care. He has reiterated guidance for elections, emphasizing protection for the unborn and migrants.

Konderla enjoys carpentry and woodworking, and he even made his own crosier before his 2016 consecration, having crafted crosiers for other bishops as well.