Most Rev. Timothy L. Doherty, S.T.L., Ph.D. was consecrated and installed as the bishop of the Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana on July 15, 2010. In 1972 he received a Bachelor of Arts degree from St. Ambrose University in Davenport, Iowa and earned a baccalaureate in theology in 1975 at the Pontifical Gregorian University during his seminary formation at the Pontifical North American College in Rome. He was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Arthur J. O’Neill for the Diocese of Rockford Illinois in 1976. He completed his license (STL) in moral theology in 1982 at the Alfonsian Academy of the Lateran University in Rome. He earned a doctorate (Ph.D.) from Loyola University Chicago in 1996, specializing in Christian Ethics.
Except for a one-year academic sabbatical, from 1976 to 1991 he was a member of the faculty at both Boylan Catholic High School in Rockford, Illinois and at Marian Central Catholic High School in Woodstock, Illinois, where he was also an assistant principal. In 1995, Bishop Thomas G. Doran appointed him the diocesan ethicist for health care issues, a role that continued into 2010. From 1996 to 1999, he was an associate professor at OSF St. Anthony College of Nursing in Rockford. In early 1999, he was the parochial administrator at St. James Parish in Lee, IL, and from June 1999 until June 2007 was pastor of St. Mary Parish in Byron, IL. In June 2007, he was appointed as pastor of St. Catherine of Siena, Dundee, and St. Mary Mission, Gilberts, IL. He served as a diocesan priest representative to the Catholic Conference of Illinois, a board member of the Illinois Catholic Health Association and president of the national Conference of Diocesan Coordinators of Health Affairs (no longer extant). Until 2010, he participated in the Archdiocese of Chicago bioethics subcommittee and the system ethics committee of OSF Healthcare in Peoria.
Bishop Doherty has served as a member of the Subcommittee on Healthcare Issues of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). He served as USCCB episcopal liaison to the Catholic Health Association of the United States Board of Trustees (May 2012 – November 2016). In November 2016, Bishop Doherty was voted by the USCCB membership to be the Chair-elect of the USCCB Committee for the Protection of Children and Young People. He chaired this committee from November 2017 until November 2020. In this capacity, he was a member of the USCCB Administrative Committee (Board of Trustees) from the Fall of 2017 until November, 2020.