Wichita ? The Rev. Michael Jackels was ordained bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Wichita on Monday in a three-hour Mass attended by about 20 other bishops.

“Wichita has been waiting for this for quite some time,” said Archbishop Joseph Naumann, of Kansas City, Kan.

Wichita had not had a bishop since December 2003, when Thomas J. Olmsted was named bishop of Phoenix.

Jackels, 50, was ordained before about 2,500 people at a Mass at the Church of the Magdalen. His appointment by Pope John Paul II was announced in January, and the pope’s letter was read aloud during the ceremony.

The Vatican’s ambassador to the United States, Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo, was unable to attend because of the pope’s death, Naumann said.

Naumann consecrated Jackels as bishop.

Jackels had been an official in a key Vatican office on doctrinal matters, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, before his appointment as bishop.

He served in the diocese of Lincoln, Neb., following his ordainment as a priest there in 1981.

The Wichita diocese has about 115,000 parishioners and covers 25 counties in southeast Kansas. It was established in 1887, and Jackels is its 10th bishop.