Maltese-Australian priest Fr Rob Galea has withdrawn from the X Factor contest in Australia, citing pastoral commitments at his parish as a primary reason.

Fr Rob, 33, chose to depart the competition during the ‘boot camp’ phase, which required him to remain in Sydney for a period of time away from his parish at St Kilian’s, Bendigo. He said the competition had been greatly rewarding, and an excellent opportunity to evangelise to a broad audience.

“While I am so grateful for the opportunity to have auditioned, got through to boot camp and worked with a wonderful team of contestants and judges, I have decided, out of my own will, to leave the Australian X Factor competition,” he announced.

“I have looked at my pastoral, church, music and touring commitments for the rest of the year and found that I cannot reasonably honour both the competition and these. Even though some may argue that this is an evangelisation opportunity missed, my first commitment is to my relationship with God and to the Church to whom I am already committed.

“After getting through to boot camp and having attended the boot camp in Sydney, I realised I had done what I needed to do. Thus, during the filming of one of the singing challenges I stepped forward towards the judges and asked to leave the competition. Unfortunately, due to circumstances beyond the producers’ control, this part of boot camp will not be aired, and thus I will not have the opportunity to explain why I left the competition during the show," he said.

Fr Galea also announced the release of a new single entitled Get up Again. Produced by Ministry of Sound producer George Bechara, Fr Rob said the song is about standing up and moving forward in spite of the pain that life brings.

Get up Again can be downloaded for free from frrobgalea.com