[2] In May 1525, King James V of Scotland recommended Campbell's appointment as Abbot of Coupar Angus, a recommendation confirmed by parliament in the following year - despite the fact that the monks of Coupar Angus Abbey had already elected one of their brothers, Alexander Spens, to the position in early 1524.
[2] While delegating the ordinary business of the abbey to monks, kinsmen and friends, and in Scotland held a variety of high-profile political offices in this period, including Senator of the College of Justice (July 1541), Lord of the Articles for the parliaments of March and December 1543 and was a member of the Privy Council (June 1545); he had visited France again in 1536.
[2] In 1549 he secured crown nomination to the bishopric of Dunkeld from the Governor of Scotland, James Hamilton, Duke of Châtellerault.
[4] The vacancy was caused by the translation of the previous bishop, John Hamilton, to the archbishopric of St Andrews in 1547.
[9] Campbell's proctor in Rome, John Row, attempted to gain permission for his master to abandon the dress Cistercian monk and to hold the bishopric of Brechin with the abbacy of Coupar Angus.
[12] He is said to have left five illegitimate sons, who were later declared legitimate in order that they might inherit estates of property given to them from the tracts of land formerly belonging to the Catholic Church and redistributed by the state post-Reformation.