Bishop Alphonsus Cullinan is the Roman Catholic Bishop of Waterford and Lismore. Born in Lahinch, County Clare in 1959, he was educated at Crescent College, he trained to be a school teacher in Mary Immaculate College, Limerick (B.Ed., 1981), and taught for six years in Castleconnell, Co Limerick, and taught english for two years in Spain prior to studying for the priesthood in St. Patrick's College, Maynooth where he was occasionally visited, with other students, events in Dublin organised by Opus Dei and the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross. He was ordained into the priesthood in 1994 (S.T.L., 1995). He served in the Diocese of Limerick, and as Chaplin in Limerick Regional Hospital.