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A Short History of Old Catholic Orthodox Heritage and Unity Originating in Europe and Migrating to America |
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A Short History of Old Catholic Orthodox Heritage and Unity Originating in Europe and Migrating to America |
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This article on the Old Catholic Church History was written by an Old Catholic Benedictine brother who lived in an Old Catholic community in Woodstock, New York. This writing is somewhat dated in that it was written and published in 1941 for a local newspaper, The Catskill Mountain Star . The only addition has been the historical information on the Apostolic Mandate of The Evangelical Orthodox Catholic Church in America as a part of that heritage and apostolic history
The division of Christendom into two great categories, Protestantism and
Catholicism, is familiar to all. But while most people know more or less
of the various denominations of Protestantism, what is known as the Catholic
Church has its administrative and disciplinary divisions with which few
people, not historians or theologians, are familiar.
Holding the same essential faith, the Eastern Orthodox Church with 180
million souls and the Roman Catholic Church with its 240 million souls,
each hold a different concept of administration. The Old Catholic Church
is unique in that it holds the Catholic faith, being in spiritual union with
the Eastern Orthodox Church, representing the Catholic Church in the western
world, but disavowing the administrative peculiarities of the Latin (Roman)
Church.
To hold a position of any kind obviously admits that there must be a counter
position -- both of which must have been arrived at through the consequences
of some action in the past. The touchstone of how closely the Old Catholic
movement represents primitive Christianity can only be shown by proving
its fidelity to the faith of the undivided Church and through the unbroken
succession of its Episcopate (Bishops). The different conceptions of truth
that people hold, like words, are paradoxical. But truth, unlike words,
remains unchanging. What was truth in the Apostolic Church is truth today.
All Christians should readily admit that the test of any principle of the
Christian faith is to present it to the mind of the early Christian Church.
It is certain that for the first nine hundred years at least, the Christian
world was united in a common bond of faith.
What was Christ's Church like, then, before words like "schism", "heretic",
"sect" were used by Christians to describe one another? We know that the
Church was one, that its faith was Catholic in the sense best described by
St. Vincent of Lerinz, "Such teaching is truly Catholic as has been believed
in all places, at all times, and by all The faithful." By this test of universality,
antiquity, and consent, all controversial points in belief must be tried.
Until the year 1054 AD when the first unhappy division took place, the
Church was as it should be, "One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic." What happened
after the division of course appears differently to the mind of every individual
and the truth becomes hard to discern. It is safe to say then, that the
only way of proving the truth of any contemporary interpretation of Christianity
is to submit it to the examination of the common mind of the Christian Church
before its division took place. Was it believed by all Christians everywhere,
at all times before the year 1054 AD? -- is the test every question of faith
should meet.
The Old Catholic Church maintains that the obvious basis of reuniting
the several divisions of the Christian Church is the common acceptance of
the Faith of the entire Church prior to the first division in the year 1054
AD from whence all the familiar divisions of today ultimately stem. This
theory admits that the 16th century Reformation is not principally responsible
for the "unhappy divisions" that beset the Christian religion in the western
world. What caused the first division was not a point of faith so much as
it was a matter of jurisdiction and administration. History reveals that
the apostolic authority vested in all the bishops governed the early Church.
Matters of faith and morals affecting the whole Church were brought before
an Ecumenical Council (of which there were seven universally accepted) over
which the five great bishops of Christendom presided. These bishops, whose
Sees represented the important cities of Jerusalem, Antioch, Constantinople,
Alexandria and Rome, were known as patriarchs in whom the Church of the ancients
recognized its sovereignty.
If we are to single out the primary cause of the first division of this
Church, it would be the deeply rooted objection of the Patriarch of Rome to
this particular theory of Church government. Rome maintained that they and
their successors held "supreme authority" over all Christendom as spiritual
heirs of St. Peter, whom, they held, was the first Bishop of Rome and to whom,
they contended, the "keys to the kingdom of heaven" were alone divinely entrusted.
The four patriarchs of the Church in the East maintained the traditional
belief in the administration of Christ's Church, offering for the sake of
unity the title "Primus inter pares" (first amongst equals) to the Roman
bishop who was and is, the Patriarch of Rome.
But with the Church of the West developing a strong belief that a kind
of primacy resided in the Roman bishop by divine enactment, the breach widened
into an open division and henceforth the Christian Church in the East and
in the West was to be distinct and divided. In the East, to this day, the
patriarchal theory of the Church's government is held, while in the West
the emphasis on the personal supremacy of the Pope over all Christendom was
gradually increased from the year 1054 until the final definition of Papal
infallibility was decreed in the Vatican Council of AD 1870 as a dogma which
all Christians were bound to accept as an article of faith.
In explanation of the abridged nature of these earlier chapters, the writer
would plead his intention of placing before the reader's eye as a picture,
as vivid and complete as possible on the state of the early Church, without
touching in a controversial spirit upon the sore points of its later history.
But since it has been necessary to go this far to bring to light the basic
reason for the existence of the Old Catholic Church, let it be noted, that
only the salient points of early history are touched upon, and those wishing
to enter more fully into details of the causes that led to the division
of Christianity are asked to refer to the pages of ordinary church histories.
What is important for our immediate purpose is merely to establish the
basis upon which a school of thought regarding the Church's administration
developed within the Roman Church, flourishing time and again in such celebrated
and glorious figures as Savanarola, Paulo Sarpl, the Scholars of Port-Royal,
the so-called "Jansenists", the
Church of Holland and others, to develop finally in the twilight of the
nineteenth century into what came to be known as "primitive" or "old" Catholicism.
We are left free now to touch upon the stirring and romantic history of
the Port-Royalists of France, the rise of the movement within the Church of
Rome and finally the dramatic Vatican Council which culminated in the definite
formation of the present Old Catholic Church movement whose purpose is not
a new reformation from without, but a quiet restoration of the Christian
Church to its original state from within.
During the 17th Century "ultra-montanism" found its principle resistance
in the Church of France, and its principle support among the Jesuits. The
Faculty of the Sorbonne proved to be a great bulwark against Roman ultra-montane
theories and championed scholars maintaining the French cause. The entire
body of French clergy drew up a declaration in 1682 AD in order to protect
the canonical rights of the French Church against the encroachments of the
Ultra-montanists. In writing this declaration of 1682, the French clergy
were mindful of the primitive teaching of the Catholic Church, restated by
the Council of Constance (1414-1418), which decreed, it had "its authority
immediately from Christ, and everyone, whatever his rank or position, even
if it be the Pope himself, is bound to obey it in all things which pertain
to the Faith, to the healing of schism, and to the general renewal of the
Church.
"This document," a contemporary historian says, "is an important
document in the history of Old Catholicism." Its contents may be summarized
under the following subheadings: (1) The Pope could not release subjects
from obedience to temporal power. The authority received by the Church from
God is spiritual, not temporal (i.e., "My Kingdom is not of this world.").
(2) That the Decrees of the Council of Constance remain in full force in
the Church. The Papal authority in no way affects the perpetual and immovable
strength of the Decrees of the Council. (3) The independence of the French
Church must be maintained -- the authority of the Apostles must be exercised
in accordance with the mind of the whole Church. (4) That the decisions
of the Pope are not infallible -- his "judgment is not
irreversible until confirmed by the consent of the whole Church" (Jervis,
Hist. Ch. France ii.p. 50).
The Declaration, signed by 34 Archbishops and Bishops and formulated under
the guidance of Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux, reaffirmed the position, which
had at all times been dear to the French Church. This document became a norm
for the conduct of relations between the National Catholic Churches of Northern
Europe and the Roman Curia. Italian Ultra-montane writers attacked the French
clergy. In response, Bishop Bossuet wrote a "Defense of the Declaration"
which so powerfully influenced belief in the principles held by the French
Church that his learned opponent, Cardinal Orsi, advised the Roman Theologians
to abandon ultra-montanism as a "hopeless" cause. However, the most powerful
factor in preserving the "Old" Catholic tradition in France was the support
of such scholars as Arnauld, Pascal, Cyran, Tillimont and others. They carried
the standards of Port Royal, the envy even today of scholars, theologians,
educators, and churchmen.
Francois Mauriac, whose judgment of Port Royal is obviously biased by personal
predilections, nevertheless admits, in his recent book on Port Royal's most
celebrated son, that "after three centuries Blaise Pascal is still alive.
His slightest thought troubles or charms or irritates, but he is understood
instantly. Pascal is the brother of all sinners, of all converts, of all
wounded men whose wounds may reopen at any instant, of all whom Christ has
pursued from afar, and who trust only in His love."
Port Royal in France was not only the vessel containing the mental and
spiritual giants of its day, but it proved a major influence in preserving
for our time the Tradition of the Church, that her children believe, and
that the Saints knew, loved, lived, and died for.
To trace the origin of Port Royal, around which the storms of Church and
State revolved in the 17th century in the controversy touching on the growth
of Papal power, it is necessary to go back to the year 1204. At that date
an Abbey was founded at the head of the Valley of the Rhodon near Chevreuse
(about 18 miles southwest of Paris) by Eudes de Sully, Bishop of Paris,
and Mathilde de Garlande, to ensure prayers for the safe return of Mathilde's
husband, Mathieu De Marly De Montmorenci, who had gone to take part in the
Fourth Crusade. The site of the Abbey was known as Port Royal, and it is
said its name derived from a corruption of the low Latin "porra" which described
the ponds and "mares" which abounded in the neighborhood.
The community of nuns of Port Royal flourished during the 14th and 15th
centuries and attained certain fame, but in the 16th century the religious
wars and the war with England tended to relax the discipline of all religious
houses--and Port Royal did not escape from this infection of its religious
life. As everywhere, in the religious houses of the time, the nuns of Port
Royal became worldly and the rule of Saint Benedict was forgotten, while for
more than thirty years, no sermon had been preached save at seven or eight
professions. The regeneration of Port Royal came about under the guidance
of Angelique Arnauld, appointed by a Papal Bull at the age of 11, in the year
1602, to be Abbess of Port Royal. Taking over the community which at that
time consisted of 10 sisters; Mere Angelique proceeded to reform it after
having been "completely converted" nine years after her appointment. She
succeeded in introducing vows of poverty and seclusion and re-introduced the
teaching work of her Abbey after it had long lain idle.
Though at first these increased austerities caused a rupture with the Arnauld
family and no little trouble with the formerly ease-loving nuns, she was
able to successfully heal all difficulties. Her energy and steadfastness
of purpose overcame all obstacles: she not only won her family to Port Royal,
but her influence made itself felt in other houses and a widespread revival
of the spiritual ideal for which the primitive Cistercians were renowned
took place. By the year 1626 Port Royal had increased the number of its inhabitants
too more than 80. To escape the unhealthy conditions engendered by the swampland
surrounding the Abbey, the community was required to take a house in Paris
to which a body of nuns removed. The two sections of the convent were thereafter
known as Port-Royal de Paris.
About 1636 A.D. a remarkable group of men--physicians, men of letters,
soldiers, scholars and ecclesiasts, influenced by a friend of Port Royal,
the Abbe de S. Cyran, took up their residence at Les Grange, near Port Royal
des Champs, where they resolved to lead a life of self-renunciation and
consecration and took for their rallying cry "Thought allied with faith",
making redemption of souls their mission. These men were the Solitaires.
They took no vows, but systematically divided their time between religious
exercises, literary pursuits, teaching and manual labor.
The Solitaires were regarded as forming a joint community with the nuns
of Port Royal, among whom many had relatives. Among these men were Antoine
Arnauld, Lemaistre de Sacy, Arnauld d'Andilly, Nicole and subsequently, Blaise
Pascal, Lancelot and others. These men conducted schools called "Les Petites
escoles de Port Royal" which soon acquired a great and undying reputation
for anticipating in many ways modern ideas of education. In the hands of these
men lay the spiritual destiny of "Old" Catholicism in France. Of them, the
saintly princess, Madame Elizabeth, a sister of Louis XVI, wrote, "Their theology
apart, that I do not understand, these gentlemen of Port Royal were holy
persons. What a life they led, compared to ours!"
The Abbey of Port Royal was more than a convent of reformed nuns and the
community of "Solitaires" more than a band of holy men gathered together
from every walk of life to give themselves wholly to God. They had ideas
which, supported by brilliant minds and holy lives, were considered dangerous
to the pretensions of ultra-montanists in Rome, scholastics and ecclesiastical
politicos. Saint Cyran had worked with Cornelius Jansen, Bishop of Ypres,
in a study of the early Fathers in an attempt to restore vitality to the
lifeless theology of the time and restore the Church to the simplicity and
purity of primitive times. Jansen's work culminated in the publication of
"Petrus Augustinus" in which their theories, based on the writings of St.
Augustine, were expounded. Saint Cyran, however, continued to apply these
theories to practice in life and the Port Royal Solitaires supported him.
The Jesuits, having been severely censured in the "Augustinus" as fostering
the ancient heresy of Pelagianism in the Church, exerted all their efforts
to have it condemned. Five propositions were presented to the Pope as having
been contained in the writings of Jansen and the request that they be condemned
heretical. Though the Jesuits' plea was heeded, historians still doubt the
likelihood that the propositions were ever-contained in Jansen's works. The
Jesuits also coined the word "Jansenist" as a term of reproach to the Port
Royalists. A formulary was drawn up in which the five propositions were condemned
and the Port Royalists were requested to sign it under pain of expulsion
and suppression.
Richelieu, who had not been able to win Saint Cyran, whom he considered
the "most learned man in Europe," to his political aims by offers of ecclesiastical
preferment's--in all five Sees which Saint Cyran refused--determined to
use the situation to put him out of the way. Through the joint attacks of
her adversaries Port Royal suffered. Saint Cyran was imprisoned on a vague
charge of heresy. The nuns and Solitaires, refusing to sign the formulary
that they were convinced was a false statement were several times dispersed,
but their powerful defense in the brilliant language of Arnauld, the stirring
writings of Pascal, and the saintly lives of the nuns and recluses held
off the fatal day of the Abbey's complete destruction and earned them undying
fame. To the doors of Port Royal flocked people hungry for spiritual nourishment
in a desert of theological bickering and dead scholasticism to find the peace
of God even I the midst of these struggles. Marie de Gonsagne, later Queen
of Poland, had lodging at Port Royal and subsequently offered the community
a refuge from their persecutors in her kingdom. But the Port Royalists did
not flee from the ordeal. Saint Cyran, upon the death of Cardinal Richelieu,
was released from prison only to die shortly afterwards from the effects
of the confinement. Mere Angelique died in 1661 in the midst of the battle.
Jacqueline Pascal, her successor remained steadfast in vindicating Port Royal
of an unjust calumniation. Writing of conditions to a friend at that time,
she says, "I know that it is not for women to defend the Faith, but when
Bishops are as timorous as women, it befits women to be as brave as Bishops."
Antoine Arnauld was stripped of his scholarly honors and died an exile, in
Holland. The combined strength of the enemy prevailed in time and the little
schools were suppressed, the Solitaires dispersed, the nuns imprisoned, and
finally in 1709, the Abbey was completely destroyed even to the desecration
of the graves.
It was said of the Port-Royalists that they led the lives of strict puritans
yet were nonetheless Catholics who bowed neither before King nor Prelate
in the defense of their Catholic faith. When a worldly prelate, friendly
to Port Royal was described as a Jansenist, it was said of him, "What, he
a Jansenist? That is impossible. To be a Jansenist one must first be a Christian."
The ruin of Port Royal was a tragic and inhuman episode in the history
of the ascendancy of the ultramontane party in the Catholic Church. The
destruction of the abbey had been the avowed purpose of its detractors,
the Jesuits, who, with the consent of King Louis XIV, thought thereby to
put an end to what they contemptuously termed "Jansenism." They failed in
this object.
The celebrated hymnographer and historian of the Church of England, John
Mason Neale in his book, "The so-called Jansenists," could say almost 200
years later, "The spirit of Port Royal lived on, and still lives." Pasquer
Quesnel, the last of the so-called "Jansenists" connected with Port Royal,
shouldered the mantle of Antoine Arnauld. Quesnel, elevated to the post
of Director of the Oratorian School in Paris early in his career, was forced
to flee France in 1684 with several others. They preferred exile rather
than signing an anti-Jansenist formula which they regarded as a "senseless
and despotic" document and which all members of the Congregation of the
Oratory were required by Rome to sign.
In Brussels he joined Antoine Arnauld and remained with him until his friend's
death in 1694 and from then on he became the "oracle" of the Port Royalists.
In May 1703 Quesnel was suddenly arrested in Brussels and thrown into the
prison of the Archbishop of Malines who had obtained an order for his arrest
from King Philip V of Spain. With the help of a Spaniard, who contrived
to make a hole in the prison wall sufficiently large to admit the egress,
Quesnel escaped. Quesnel fled to Amsterdam where, after the fall of Port
Royal, he continued with friends to fulfill the mission of conscientious
Catholics. He died at Amsterdam in 1709 in time to witness the seeds of
his mission bearing fruit. For in Holland, the means whereby Catholics cut
off from the Church of Rome could cling to the Catholic Faith and maintain
its primitive doctrine was at hand. The French cause upheld by the Gallican
(French) Bishops against the growing claims of the Bishop of Rome, the Pope,
was to be crushed under the heel of Napoleon, who proved an unwitting ally
of ultra-montanists. However, the Tradition and Episcopate of the Catholic
Church was to be carried on through the Church of Holland and preserved until
the day when the ultimate goal of ultra-montanism, the Declaration of Papal
Infallibility, was to enslave all Roman Catholics to the will of a few and
leave a portion of the Catholic flock, that adhered to the old and unchangeable
faith of the Christian Church, without shepherds.
Here the intervention of the Hand of God, through the agency of Dominique
Mary Varlet, Roman Catholic Bishop of Ascalon, forged the link by which
Old Catholics the world over were to receive an Episcopate of undeniable
Catholic authority and Apostolic succession. The Church of Holland,
which had provided shelter for many of the clergy of France from the persecution
of the Jesuits, was itself to be the scene of the next stage of the struggle.
With the rise of ultra-montanism the traditional right of the Church of
Holland to elect its own Archbishop was in jeopardy. The Metropolitan Chapter
of the Cathedral Church at Utrecht had, from the beginning, possessed the
right of electing its own Archbishop who exercised all ecclesiastical authority
over the affairs of the Roman Catholic Church in Holland.
In 1697, exercising this customary privilege, the Chapter elected Peter
Codde, their Vicar General and already Bishop of Sebaste, as their Archbishop.
The Pope would not recognize this election and substituted a person of his
own appointment, Theodore de Cock, who was expelled by the Chapter. But
with the death of Archbishop Codde the See of Utrecht became vacant and
Rome, refusing to accept Bishops elected by the Metropolitan Chapter, adopted
a policy of withholding the Episcopate from the Church of Holland in the
hope that the independent Church of Holland would submit to the will of the
papacy or die a natural death.
Bishop Varlet, a French refugee in Holland, at the request of the Chapter,
braved Papal censure by successively consecrating Cornelius Steenoven (1724)
and Cornelius Jan Burchman (1725) as Archbishops of Utrecht. The celebrated
canonist, Van Espen, defended the rights of the Chapter to elect its own
Archbishop. The Church of Utrecht continues to this day in preserving an
independent Catholic Episcopate in Holland whose validity has never been
questioned by Roman Catholic authorities.
There were Catholics in countries other than France and Holland that opposed the growth of the new interpretation of Papal authority. In England and Ireland opposition to ultra-montanism was great. Vigorous attempts to "Romanize" these countries were inaugurated and a clear distinction was made between "Catholics" and "Romanists." "Catholics" frankly committed themselves to the rejection of Papal infallibility. In 1780 a committee of Roman Catholics in England declared that of the total number of priests in England, estimated at 360, the whole body of clergy including their four Bishops, with the exception of 110 Jesuits, opposed ultra-montanism.
William E. Gladstone in his book "Vaticanism" quotes Bishop Baine, a Roman Catholic Bishop in England in 1822, as saying, "Bellarmine and some other theologians, chiefly Italians, have believed the Pope infallible when proposing "ex cathedra" an article of faith. But in England and Ireland I do not believe that any Catholic maintains the infallibility of the Pope." The Pastoral Address of the Irish Bishops to the clergy and laity in 1826 declared that, "It is not an article of the Catholic Faith, neither are they thereby required to believe that the Pope is infallible." An official Catechism of the English Roman Catholics is the famous Keenan's Catechism in which, previous to the year 1870; the following question and answer were contained. "(Q) Must not Catholics believe the Pope in himself to be infallible? (A) This is a Protestant invention: It is not an article of the Catholic faith."
The ultra-montanists in Rome hoped to eliminate this belief amongst the
Roman Catholics of Great Britain and Ireland by a process of "Romanizing."
Cardinal Wiseman "the instrument under God to Romanize England" and Manning,
his successor, "he could not go too far in conceptions designated ultramontaine"
were especially selected by Rome, over the objections of the local clergy,
for this purpose. "Thus by the oppression of independent thought and a rewriting
of history, imposed by Romanized Bishops upon a reluctant community," says
a recent historian, "a process of 'changing' the thought of English and
Irish Catholics was attempted." These attempts were resisted by Catholics
and were unsuccessful even to the time of the Vatican Council in 1870 when
several Irish and English Bishops openly opposed the new theories of papal
prerogatives.
In Germany, too, under the celebrated theologian, Ignatius von Dolinger,
and on the continent everywhere, "old" Catholics were strong and numerous
enough to resist the encroachments of this terrifying novelty, little dreaming
that the proposition so much dreaded by Catholics everywhere would be considered
seriously enough to be proclaimed as a article of Faith binding upon all
the faithful. Up to the eve of the famous Vatican I Council we have
shown, in the preceding chapters, the uninterrupted existence within the
Roman Church of "old" Catholics struggling always to maintain an unmutilated
faith in the Catholic Church. But with the curtain rising on the first Vatican
Council, we enter the final phase of their struggles, a period that is, from
any point of view, the most critical in the history of the papacy. On the
18th of July 1870 the transition of Roman Catholicism into a new phase of
Catholicism took place, to leave only a remnant of the faithful clinging
to what the Church had always, everywhere believed-the "old" Catholic Faith,
unchanged, yet progressively revealing.
Sensing the growing intellectual freedom of Catholics everywhere, the Ultramontanists
felt that only by an absolute dictatorship over the thoughts and conscience
of the faithful could Rome regain its former power over the entire occidental
world-a power weakened by the great Protestant Reformation. The establishment
of such a dictatorship they sought, and obtained, through the agency of
the first Vatican Council of 1870. Up to the time of this Council the personal
infallibility of the Pope was considered nothing more than a "pious opinion"
held by a faction within the Church. The larger part of the Catholic Church
so little believed in it, that when Protestants reproached them with this
superstition, Roman theologians regarded it as a calumny. The Vatican Council
was a bold step in an attempt to make what had formerly been regarded as a
"Protestant invention" into the keystone of the Catholic Faith.
Pius IX, an aging pope without much theological culture, who had been inspired
by the Jesuits into sensing his own personal infallibility, accordingly,
to secure the official recognition of the Church by a so-called General Council
in this matter, summoned the Vatican Council to open on the Feast of the
Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (8th December 1870). On
that very day, fifteen years earlier, Pius IX had himself proclaimed this
new dogma, and a fervid prelate, who had just returned from a visit to Lourdes,
assured him: "The Pope has said to Mary, "You are immaculate." And now Mary
answers the Pope, "And you are infallible." In the Vatican Council the representatives
of the great majority of Roman Catholics, the German, French, Austrian,
English, Czech, Irish and American bishops, oddly enough formed the minority.
The great majority was to be found in Italian Bishops representing numerous
diminutive dioceses and in titular Bishops without dioceses, whose expenses,
Cardinal Schwarzenburg said, "the Pope was obliged to pay entirely, even
to their very socks, so that they voted blindly at his bidding. The minority
had little opportunity of voicing their opposition to the creation of the
new dogma. An order of business described by a Roman Catholic Archbishop,
who was present at the Council as "a cursed congeries of pitfalls," precluded
all free discussion. If the minority could not be heard in Council and wished
to have a memoir of their opposition printed, the printing houses of Rome
were forbidden to serve them. Pamphlets mailed from out of the country were
sequestered and never delivered. Anyone answering the Pope with an appeal
to Christian Tradition was silenced with "I am tradition." In a last minute
appeal to the Pope, when several bishops were allowed an audience, the proud
bishop of Mainz, Baron von Kotteler, fell on his knees weeping to implore
the Pope not to formulate the fatal dogma of his own infallibility. Finally,
when the dogma was met with its first vote, eighty-eight voted against it,
ninety-one bishops refrained from voting, and sixty-two voted yea only conditionally.
The opposition departed from Rome before a second vote was taken rather
than be called upon either to support the hated dogma or personally offend
the Pope by voting negatively.
With all opposition dispersed the Roman ultramontanists sealed their triumph
in the final vote with still two negative voices on July 18th, 1870. On
that day, in the midst of one of the fiercest storms to break across the
city of Rome, accompanied by thundering and lightning, while rain poured
in through the broken glass of the roof near him, Pius IX rose in the darkness,
and by the aid of the feeble light of a candle, read the momentous affirmation
of his own infallibility. "We declare it to be an article of faith that the
Roman Pope possesses infallibility in any doctrine relating to faith and
morals. If anyone shall oppose this our decision, which God forbid, let him
be accursed," The storm has been variously interpreted by friend or foe,
as comparable to the solemn legislation of Mt. Sinai or as tokens of Divine
displeasure and approaching desolation. But whatever constructions were placed
upon the circumstances surrounding the birth of this new dogma, the Western
Church was indisputably bound to a new interpretation of its Catholicity.
Tradition and Scripture were no longer necessary. Instead, every Christian
under pain of being accursed was hereafter to know that on any matter concerning
his Faith, he would have to be content with the answer "the Pope has spoken,
the cause is ended."
With the declaration of the doctrine of papal infallibility at the closing
session of the First Vatican Council in 1870, a new condition of faith was
to be imposed on all Catholics. As far as the Roman ultramontanists were
concerned, the question that stirred men's hearts within the church for centuries
past was now settled-in their favor. "The Pope had spoken" indeed,
but the cause was by no means ended. In fact, the real struggle was now taking
shape.
There were able and learned members of the Roman Catholic Church to whom
it was impossible to reconcile the new dogma with what they had always believed.
The Catholic consciousness of early ages presented a theory out of which
papal infallibility could never legitimately grow. The primitive theory,
as the great Councils of the undivided Church made plain, placed final authority
in the ecumenical council of all the bishops of the entire church and the
transference of this authority from the entire body of the church to one
individual was not a true Catholic development at all, but a dislocation
of the original constitution of the Church.
If most of the Bishops were coerced or threatened by official intimidation
to accept the new belief, there were others that officialdom could not touch
nor frighten. Several Bishops refused to publish the new dogma within their
diocese. In America, Archbishop Kenrick of St. Louis, whose speech against
the new dogma was suppressed in Council, expressed the unspoken feelings
of many of the bishops in the following memorable sentence.
"Notwithstanding my submission, I shall never teach the doctrine of Papal
Infallibility so as to argue from Scripture or tradition in its support,
and shall leave to others to explain its compatibility with the facts of
ecclesiastical history to which I referred in my reply. As long as I may
be permitted to remain in my present station I shall confine myself to administrative
functions which I can do the more easily without attracting attention, as
for some years past I have seldom preached."
But once again if Bishops were to prove as "weak and fearful" in the face
of official Roman displeasure, then it remained for theologians and scholars
to defend the faith. Such men as von Shulte, Reinkins, Lord Acton, von Dollinger
and other distinguished scholars of northern Europe continued in outspoken
and fearless opposition to the new Faith of the Roman curia. A revulsion
to the new dogma arose like a swift tide amongst lay-folk and clergy throughout
northern Europe where the Roman doctrine had to be enforced, if at all,
with persecution where Episcopal persuasion proved fruitless.
In Bavaria public agitation rose high and priests refused to accept or
publish the new Vatican decrees in their parishes. As early as three weeks
after the close of the Council more than a thousand Rhenish Roman Catholics
at Konigwinter, Germany, united in the declaration that "they did not accept
the decrees in regard to the absolute power and personal infallibility of
the pope but rejected them as contradicting the traditional faith of the
ancient apostolic Church." Shortly before this, forty-three professors and
teachers of the University of Munich, not members of the theological faculty,
drew up a similar declaration, and this was followed in April 1871 by the
"Munich Museum" address with eighteen thousand signers, which went to the
government, its purpose being "to prevent the adoption in church and school
of the new dogma and to revise the relations of church and state." m tradition
and the Scriptures.
The actual rebuilding of the church was far more difficult than the creation of thousand-voiced protests. How should it take shape? These men, pious Catholics, inflamed with the passion for truth, desired to remain where they were. For this very reason genuine Catholicism, not the Roman ultra-montanist, but the ideal Catholicism of the Church as it had always, everywhere been known was the cherished hope of their souls and the pattern after which they wanted to build. Irrevocably outlawed by the Roman Church it was not to take form outside of that body and its destiny lay in their hands.
In this sense, the Munich Congress, made up of three hundred delegates
from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, with numerous guests from all Christian
lands of the earth, as early as September 1871 made out this distinct program:
"We firmly hold to the Old Catholic Faith as attested by tradition and the
Scriptures as also to Catholic worship."
They rejected the newly created dogmas of Pius IX, including that of the
Immaculate Conception of Mary, and further declared, "We aim, with the cooperation
of theological and canonical science, at a reform of the church which, conceived
in the spirit of the ancient church, shall remove the existing defects and
abuses, and in particular meet the just wishes of the Catholic people for
constitutionally regulated participation in church affairs."
In Cologne, Germany, the following year, another congress under the direction
of Dr. von Dollinger went still further in a practical direction. Under
the leadership of Dr. von Schulte the determinative features of the Old
Catholic church order were fixed. The Bishop was to have all rights common
to his office, but the clergy and laity were given a voice in the direction
of legislation and discipline. The Bishop was to be presiding officer of
the Council but elected by it. No pastor was to be appointed who was not
first acknowledged by the members of the local parish. No taxes for dispensation
and appointments were to be raised. These formed the fundamental principles
of the movement, apart from its allegiance to the traditional faith of the
Church, which in opposition to "Roman" or "Vatican" Catholicism began to
take form ecclesiastically under the name "Old Catholic."
In Germany, Austria, and Switzerland reaction amongst faithful Catholics
to the new Vatican decrees were swift. Entire parish communities refused
to accept the new decrees and joined together in common councils to reaffirm
their faith in the Scriptures and the authentic Catholic Tradition of the
Church and to decide on their future course. Under brilliant leadership
the movement rose to meet the challenge of persecution and intimidation
which its larger erring sister church of Rome now leveled at it. Priests
were cut off from their pensions unless they subscribed to the new dogma
of Papal Infallibility, which soon became known amongst them as the "hunger
dogma." Boycott and social ostracism and even the arm of the state were employed
by the infuriated Roman ultramontanists in their attempts to force the submission
of the recalcitrant Catholic population to their wishes. Against all this
the conscientious faith of thousands of earnest Christians stood firm.
Though these Catholics preserved the faith, as they had always believed it,
the question that was not fearfully evident to the bishopless flock was how
to continue the succession of this faith for unborn generations. It was necessary
with the establishment of the Old Catholic Church order and its independent
government that a bishop be chosen. But how could a legitimate bishop be
obtained, since according to Catholic conception, such a one could be consecrated
only by another legitimate bishop?
Here the River of History, which now and again flows wide only to break
off into different channels, now flowed together again. The Catholic Church
of Holland came to the aid of the Old Catholic Church Movement. From the time
when the pope and the Jesuits had first attempted to subjugate it, the Catholic
Church of Holland had withstood her trials through the years, firm in its
position and preserving its sacred badge of Apostleship in the legitimate
Catholic succession of her bishops. It was in the year 1145, at the request
of the Holy Roman Emperor, Conrad III, that Blessed Pope Eugene III granted
the Catholic See of Utrecht the right of election of its own bishops. The
Fourth Council of the Lateran confirmed this grant in 1215. In 1520, Pope
Leo X in the Bull, "Debitum Pastoralis," granted to the Catholic See of
Utrecht and its 57th Bishop, Phillip of Burgundy, the right of adjudication
of its own affairs "without reference to the tribunals of the Holy See."
The Theological Faculties of Paris and the Louvain, in 1717, verified this
privilege, known as the Leonine Privilege.
So it was therefore, that the Dutch Archbishop, Loos, in 1872, had helped
the German Old Catholics with confirmation and was willing to consecrate
their bishop, but it was necessary first for the Old Catholic Church movement
to have the recognition of the state. Dr. von Schulte applied to the Prussian
Government and received Royal recognition, as a Catholic, for the bishop
to be elected, as well as a grant of 48,000 marks for the expenses of the
bishop and his administration. Old Catholicism, without this recognition
of the state, would have been, in the eyes of many European peoples, a sect,
and it would have meant a renunciation on the part of the Old Catholic movement
of its legal standing and its right to the same support which the Roman
Church enjoyed if it had not sought this recognition. With this accomplished
the delegates of the German congregations, both clerical and lay, in the
manner of the ancient Church in the chapel of the City Hall of Cologne June
4th, 1873, unanimously elected Professor D. Reinkins, of Bonn, as their
future Bishop. As Archbishop Loos had just died, Bishop Heykamp of Deventer
consecrated the first Old Catholic Bishop for Germany. In Switzerland
in 1876 Bishop Herzog was consecrated Bishop of the Old Catholic Movement
there. Thus the scattered fragments of Christ's Church were gathered together.
In time the movement developed sufficiently in other parts of the world
to warrant the necessity of Episcopal supervision and gradually the jealously
guarded Catholic Episcopate came to bless these faithful children of the
Catholic Church of Christ in increasing numbers everywhere. In Austria,
Czechoslovakia, Italy, Switzerland, France, Yugoslavia and Poland the movement
grew and took root and Bishops were consecrated at Utrecht, Holland, for
almost all these countries. Out of the hard struggles of countless
intrepid little bands of Catholic priests and laymen all the elements within
the Church that rebelled against the corruption of its faith and realized
the original Christian Ideal of the one Flock of Christ, were drawn together
and, if at first in the shape of a small model only, assumed the form of
the ancient Church again.
But the greater works of this small church were only now to begin even
if its martyrs and saints, the progenitors in small numbers through the
ages, lay in eternal sleep. A new spiritual impetus, an "evangelical Catholic
spirit" was to be borne on the first winds of the twentieth century as they
swept, first across Poland, then through England, France, the Balkans, and
then to America, to bring a new sense of spiritual freedom with the old and
unchanging truths of Christianity. Born to set the souls of all people
free.
In England a movement began in 1908 which resulted in the formation of the Old Catholic Church in England. In that year the distinguished English priest, Dr. Arnold Harris Mathew, de jure Earl of Llandoff, who had left the Roman Church, was consecrated by the Archbishop of Utrecht assisted by all the continental Old Catholic Bishops, at the Cathedral Church of Saint Gertrude, in the Archepiscopal See of Utrecht, Holland on April 28th, and placed in charge of the English mission. On Saint Paul's Day, 1911, he was elected Archbishop and Metropolitan of Great Britain.
The Archbishop and his little flock in England soon found themselves in
double danger. Added to the natural differences with their former brethren
in the Roman Church was a campaign of persecution directed by certain elements
among the Anglicans of the state Church of England, described by Dr. Willibroad
Beyschleg, Professor of the university of Holland, and a noted Old Catholic
historian, as "those who emphatically desire to be "catholic" but are at
the same time wholly out of sympathy with Old Catholics." They were a small
group of ritualistic churchmen of the established English Church "on the
way to Rome," while the Old Catholics were "on the way FROM Rome."
Certain unprincipled elements of this Anglican "Anglo-Catholic" group exerted
pressure on the Dutch Church to disavow the English Old Catholics, but without
result. At one time they intended to besmirch the English Archbishop's character
by elaborating on a statement made by a Roman Catholic editor that Bishop
Mathew's credentials to the Dutch Church contained false statements, but
the Bishops of Holland, after a thorough investigation themselves vindicated
Bishop Mathew. The Roman priest himself recalled the original statement,
saying that since he made it he had satisfied himself by a personal investigation
that it was groundless. The clique of English churchmen continued to use
this disreputable stratagem against the Old Catholics in the English speaking
world even after Bishop Mathew's death. Bishop Mathew, however, maintained
a high standard of Christian tolerance and continued his work, unmoved by
the persistent noisiness of his detractors who nonetheless caused him much
pain.
As evidence of their confidence in Archbishop Mathew, the Dutch Bishops had him participate in every consecration of Utrecht establishing a new Episcopate on the Continent of Europe until his death in 1919. Bishop Mathew assisted at the Consecration of Bishop Jan Michael Kowalski and two assistant Bishops for the Old Catholic Church in Poland which from that period on was to have close historical and ecclesiastical relations with English-speaking Old Catholics. A noted author and historian, Bishop Mathew had an excellent knowledge of the Orthodox Church and established the most cordial relations between the English Old Catholics and the Patriarchal See of Antioch through his Eminence the Most Reverend Archbishop Gearrasimos Messara of Beirut, Syria, who on August 5th, 1911, received the Old Catholics under Bishop Mathew into union and full communion with the Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch. Thus a genuine and practical rapprochement between the Catholics of the East and of the West was for the first time established after a breach which had lasted almost 10 centuries.
What distinguished the scholarly Archbishop Mathew and the Episcopate he established in Scotland and America from that of the continental Old Catholics was his insistence on the inviolable Episcopal authority of each national body of Old Catholics. This had been in the minds of the original Old Catholic congresses, but the German Episcopate, because of its preponderance of numbers and wealth attempted to create a small hierarchical system patterned on the Roman administration with the Archbishop of Utrecht in the position of ranking prelate or "little pope." The English Old Catholics, seeing in this the possibilities of the former mistake of the Western Church with a Germanic, instead of an Italian, spiritual protectorate over the whole Christian world, restated the original Old Catholic principles of autonomy and have received the support of their Orthodox friends in this respect.
Bishop Mathew's personal contribution to the Old Catholic Movement can
be summed up as a broadening of the Catholic mind to an acceptance of the
necessity of the unifying of Christ's Church on the basis of the original
tenets of the Christian Faith as it was once believed by all Christians
everywhere, and the recognition that this can only be accomplished by complete
cooperation with Christians of the Eastern Churches, whose proximity in
language, in tradition, and in mind with the early Christians, makes them
the ideal vehicle.
By far, one of the most important early 19th century events in the development of the Old Catholic Church Movement has been the Mariavite Order in Poland. The nucleus of this movement was a community of nuns, founded in 1893 and organized under the Rule of Saint Francis for the promotion of asceticism and the moral purification of the Polish Church. These nuns were teachers in the parochial schools of Poland and greatly influenced the lives of the clergy and laity in whatever part of the nation they ministered. An order of priests, observing the Franciscan rule was added to them and in 1909 there were 68 priests and a large number of students ready for ordination. These two communities were solemnly bound by an understanding that their work was to begin with a moral regeneration amongst their own kind within the Church-the clergy and religious orders. From the first they were actively opposed by the Polish Jesuits and at last an order came from Rome that they were to be dissolved. When they refused to break up their community life, they were formally condemned in April 1906, and in December 1906, all their members and adherents cut off from the rites of the Roman Church.
A period of bitter persecution set in, but somehow they managed to keep
together and increase their numbers. The Polish peasants were stirred up
against the "Mariaviten" and their woman leader, "The Little Mother," to
such a degree that armed attacks were made against the followers when they
gathered together in religious meetings. The Roman authorities at one time
circulated a report that the Sacrament consecrated by the Mariavite priests
became not the Body of Christ, but an Incarnation of the Devil, and in consequence
terrible sacrileges were committed against Mariavites and several of their
churches were burned to the ground.
With the growth of its numbers and in increasing necessity of episcopal
supervision for its parishes the Order at last decided to ask the Old Catholics
to consecrate a bishop for them. Accordingly the bishop-elect Brother Jan
Michael Kowalski and two of his brethren were sent to the international Old
Catholic Congress in Vienna in 1909. Through the great Russian theologian,
General Alexander Kireef, they were introduced to the delegates of the Congress.
There, on the last morning of the meeting, Brother Kowalski stated the ground
of his appeal and asked the prayers and sympathy of the assemblage. The Mariavite
priests with their bare sandal feet and gray habits formed a striking and
arresting impression in the midst of the other delegates and their genuine
and simple character won them many new friends. After careful consultation
the Old Catholic Bishops accepted their application and the first bishop
of the Church in Poland, Brother-Bishop Jan Michael Kowalski, was consecrated
at Utrecht, Holland, early in October of that year.
For the next several years, the Old Catholic Church in Poland had steadily
increased. In February and March of 1909 the Minister of the Interior of
the Polish government gave the Mariavite order official state recognition.
Within the parishes, Churches, parsonages, schools, and other institutions
were rapidly built. In the parish of Lodz in 1910, where there were already
40,000 Mariavites, four handsome Churches were built entirely through the
efforts, personal and manual, of the clergy and laity. Driven by the boycott
of their Roman Catholic neighbors to depend more and more upon their own
efforts, the members of the Mariavite movement soon developed a civil as
well as a religious form of community amongst themselves. They worked and
traded with each other, supporting one another, creating their own industries
and soon, by cooperation, they rendered themselves entirely independent.
Cooperation stores in villages and lodging houses in towns were organized.
Hospitals staffed by their own doctors and nurses, orphanages, schools, homes
for the aged, soup kitchens, milk dispensaries, fire departments, cultural
activities, farms of magnificent acreage, factories-in fact all the necessary
prerequisites of modern living-were developed and organized within their
own groups and used to serve their neighbors. Though this social and
industrial reorganization greatly improved the position of the Old Catholics
in Poland, it had to be accompanied by great personal sacrifices. In one
town, Leszno, where cooperative factories on a large scale-for bookbinding,
shoemaking, cabinet making, and similar activities-had been organized, several
families handed over all their property to the community and put their own
services unreservedly at its disposal.
Underlying the power and vitality of this movement which led to wholly
new social groupings and industrial experiments was the ever present guidance
of a strong and inspired leader-a woman, Mary Francis Felicia, devotedly
acknowledged by all as "Mateszka." Simple and unassuming in manner she nonetheless
provoked a religio-social movement worth the consideration of the world's
serious minds. She proved to be, in the fullest sense, the "little mother"
of her people.
The Mariavite Movement was, up to that time, significantly different from
any similar religious manifestation. It is in effect the working out of
a practical application to life of the social significance of the Gospel
The foundress of the movement, the Little Mother, Mary Francis Felicia,
believed and taught that the Kingdom of God on Earth is to be understood
as a divinely human society-a society in which justice, brotherhood, equality
and the general welfare of all its members prevailed. Basically, the Little
Mother established her theory on the formula that for God's Kingdom to come
on earth His will must also be done.
The Mariavites believe that the curing of all social ills rests in properly
relating the human element to the spiritual regeneration of family, nation
and society. But since ethical theories and social realignments in themselves
are not enough, they maintain that the "direct action of God" working on
the human spirit is essential. "The direct action of God," they say, "is
fulfilled in the partaking of Holy Communion, which, in the opinion of the
Mariavites, must be the "daily bread" of men and women." In this sense the
entire religious and social life of the Mariavites centers upon the Holy
Eucharist at which the faithful communicate as a means of daily regenerating
the human spirit and as the first step toward the regeneration of society
and the realization of the Kingdom of God on earth.
Christianity, according to the Mariavites, is to be lived. Worship enters
into every field of human activity. Its end and sole purpose cannot be found
in religious gatherings held at stated periods alone. The act of worship,
the liturgy, is an active and motivating experience in the lives of all
that take part in it. During World War II more than 350,000 followers in
Poland demonstrated the possibility of this life of faith and work even
under the trying exigencies of world conflict. Oddly enough, women
play the important part in this religious movement. It was first founded
by a woman who also directed its social possibilities. The administration
of major communities of the movement in many parts of the country was in
the hands of women. The work of the sisters had been of such beneficial
influence that they have been asked by the populace of many sections to administer
parochial activities. Of the total number of about 1571 religious workers,
including clergy, brothers of the Order and the sisterhood, more than one
thousand of them are women actually engaged in the administration of the
movement. The General Chapter which meets to elect new officers and
to decide the general administrative policy of the movement has an equal
representation of women with votes. The Mother General of the Sisters must
take part in the election of a new Archbishop as well as in all proceedings
of the General Chapter. The religious workers of the Movement were grouped
into three categories. First there were the priests and members of the brotherhood
who lived under the Rule of Saint Francis. The community of nuns, about 600
in number, compose another group to which were added about 400 deaconess's
under the supervision of the Mother General.
Under the third grouping some 500 [persons following a modified religious
rule, gave their time and energies to the movement. Of this last number
a great many consist of married couples voluntarily devoting their lives
to buttress the work of the clergy and the sisterhood. Joy is a paramount
requisite of a Christian life and the Mariavites everywhere radiate a warm
and becoming mirth. The zeal of the Movement touched the peasant populations
of central Europe and awakened a living religious movement amongst them.
A Pole wiring of the effect this movement has on the people says, "From
the surrounding neighborhood of their habitations there would be a flood
of thirsty souls eager for God and His mercy." People when they met the
Mariavites turned to God with such a subsequent change in their mode of life
that even the Jews were wont to say, "What kind of new Christians are these."
The Old Catholic Church under the administration of the Mariavite Order
in Poland was in every way a distinct and important demonstration of the
possibility of a 20th century Christian social order. From Poland their influence
spread to other parts of the world where in some places it became well established.
Marivavite missions were founded in Lithuania, France, England, South and
North America. Mariavites supported themselves with the labor of their
own hands and offered their ministrations freely to all without salaries,
mission funds are not a necessary consideration of the movement. The Church,
they would say, is here to give every assistance to people both for their
spiritual and material well being; it does not have to take from them. Perhaps
it might yet be said of the Mariavites everywhere in the world, as it was
then said of them in Poland, "Wherever there is a Mariavite there is neither
hunger nor sorrow." *The name "Mariavite" does not connote any doctrinal
significance but refers to the name assumed by the nuns and taken from the
Latin for "the life of Mary."
The growth of the Old Catholic Church in America presents a pattern at once historically unique and tragic, revealing as it does the unfriendliness with which its participants were received and the unhealthy persecution which certain religionists have consistently leveled at it. Here in this land where at last a free religion was finding expression where such an expression was constitutionally guaranteed it was regarded with distrust and suspicion by the more Catholic-minded Protestants who felt the movement to be an "intrusion" and did everything possible to confuse its people. That the Old Catholic Church has survived the heart-breaking opposition of certain denominational Christians to whom she has held out her hands for an expression of brotherliness and understanding, and that her clergy have continued in their ministrations, undaunted by the trying circumstances into which the ignorance of their detractors often placed them, is the more wonderful.
The general sentiments directed against the Old Catholic Church by those
who might have been its greatest friends was aptly summed up in the words
of Frederick Cook Morehouse, Editor of the Living Church, who wrote an editorial
in that paper of January 26, 1907, concerning the first Old Catholic Bishop,
"Consecrated in 1897, Bishop Kozlowski began his Episcopate against the
indignant protests of American churchmen at what was deemed an act of intrusion
on the part of his consecrators. No friendly hand was outstretched
to meet him from the American Church (Protestant Episcopal). We had an abundance
of sympathy for Old Catholics in Europe, but none for Old Catholics in America."
Under this unhappy indictment the Old Catholic Movement was formed under
the leadership of brave men who nonetheless could never comprehend the attitude
of their Christian contemporaries who refused to understand them and yet
could not let them alone to worship in the way their conscience dictated.
Stemming out of the dissatisfaction of several foreign-born groups of Roman
Catholics for the temporal administration of their ecclesiastical superiors
the Old Catholic Church soon developed in America into three channels each
dominated and limited by its own language. Belgians under the guidance of
a former Roman Catholic, Pere Joseph Rene Vilatte, were centered chiefly
in Wisconsin near Green Bay, where several parishes had been organized. Under
Monsignor Jan Francis Tichy and several assistant clergymen a movement of
Czech people with its headquarters at Cleveland, Ohio, was in the process
of formation as early as 1890 while under Father Kozlowski in Chicago, Illinois,
the largest group, mostly of Polish extraction was making rapid progress.
Anton Kozlowski had accepted the Old Catholic faith along with 15 other
priests who had left the Roman Church with him to guide the movement amongst
American Poles. He was elected to be their Bishop and in 1897 he was consecrated
in Berne, Switzerland, by Bishop Herzog, who was assisted by Archbishop
Gul of Utrecht and Bishop Weber of Bonn, Germany.
At the Old Catholic Congress of Olten, 1904, Bishop Kozlowski was accompanied
by Mgr. Tichy who had been sent to the Old Catholics by the American Czechs
as their Bishop-Elect to pray for consecration at their hands. In 1905 Mgr.
Tichy was appointed by Archbishop Gul of Utrecht as Episcopal administrator
of non-Polish Slavs in the United States with the purpose of bringing them
over to Old Catholicism and he was subsequently consecrated as Bishop by
Bishop Kozlowski for this work. With the death of the Polish Bishop
in November of 1907, many of the Polish members of the movement fell into
the defection of one of the clergy, Francis Hodur, who organized a movement
now known as the Polish National Reformed Church in America
.
In the meantime, a group of English-speaking Old Catholics were being gathered
together by the untiring efforts of a former Roman Catholic monk, the learned
Dom Augustine de Angelis (William Harding), who had organized a community
of men devoted to the Religious Rule of Saint Benedict at Waukegan, Illinois.
This community along with the missions under its care was received into
the jurisdiction of Bishop Tichy in 1907. On St. Patrick's Day, 1911, William
Henry Francis, who had been elected Prior of the Community was ordained
to the Priesthood by Bishop Tichy and on April 20th, 1913, he was consecrated
Mitered Abbot. Upon the retirement of Bishop Tichy in 1914, Mgr. Francis
was appointed to take charge of the diocese.
In 1914 Monsignor Francis was elected to be Consecrated Bishop of the Diocese
formerly held by Bishop Tichy whose ill health forced him to give up his
duties. Since by this time relations between the American movement and the
Old Catholic Church in England had been closely knit and the strengthening
of the bonds existing between them was desirable the young Bishop-elect was
to have gone to Europe for his Consecration. But the world war made such
an undertaking impossible at the time and it was not until two years later
that the opportunity of establishing the European Episcopate in America presented
itself. In the meantime a Bishop of the Old Catholic Church, consecrated
by Archbishop Mathew of England, had arrived in America. He was the Right
Reverend Bishop de Landas Berghes et de Rache, a prince of the house of Larraine-Brapant
who was consecrated Old Catholic Bishop in Scotland but whose relations with
the Austrian Royal house marked him in Great Britain for possible internment.
At the suggestion of the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury, Bishop de Landas came to America late in the year of 1914 with letters of introduction from that English prelate to several sympathetic Protestant churchmen. He was received with great cordiality by the Protestant Episcopal Bishop of New York and was a guest for more than a year within his diocese. On Tuesday, January 12, 1915, by invitation of Bishop Greer, then Protestant Episcopal Bishop of New York, Bishop de Landas took part with 13 Protestant Episcopal Bishops at the Consecration of the Reverend Dr. Huse as missionary Bishop in Cuba of the Protestant Episcopal Church, at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City.
The Reverend W. E. Bentley, an Episcopalian clergyman, wrote in a current journal that, "the participation of Bishop de Landas in this event was of more than usual interest and importance for it was the first time since the Reformation that a Bishop who is in communion with the Holy Eastern Orthodox Church and whose Orders are derived directly from Rome has taken part in an Anglican Consecration."
In the spring of 1916, at the request of the European Old Catholic Bishops, Bishop de Landas took up residence with the Old Catholic community at Waukegan, Illinois, and, with the direct authorization of Archbishop Mathew of England, he consecrated Monsignor William Henry Francis to the Episcopate on October 3rd, 1916, in the community Church in the presence of a large congregation (friends and relatives of the present writer were also in attendance).
Although Bishop de Landas was received with the greatest cordiality and
respect by his many friends within Protestant communions to whom he always
showed the greatest of Christian brotherliness, he received, as did all
English-speaking Old Catholic Bishops, the implacable enmity of the "Living
Church" group within the Protestant Episcopal Church. Hounded by their bitterly
malicious attacks wherever he went, Bishop de Landas, broken spirited and
confused by their constant inconsistencies, at last accepted the haven generously
offered him by a community of Augustinian monks at Villanova, Pennsylvania,
where he retired until his death to a life of simplicity and prayer. His
passing away in November of 1920 evoked this written message from the Augustinian
superior to the sorrowing Old Catholic confreres of the Bishop at Waukegan,
Illinois: "I do not know what was published in "The Living Church," but while
he was with us he edified all by his humble, retiring and sincere manner
of living. He sought no exemptions but performed all his duties as simply
as the youngest and humblest Novice."
With the passing away of Bishop de Landas the weight of responsibility
in administering the Movement was placed entirely in the hands of the young
Bishop Francis of Waukegan. This young man had already distinguished himself
by the exemplary work he had conducted in his missions and had earned the
good wishes and friendship of many for the Old Catholic cause. Known to the
people of the vicinity in which he worked and where as a child he came to
reside with his family after their arrival from Nottingham, England, he had
forsaken the opportunities of the business world to minister to the uncared
for, exploited immigrants working in the steel mills of the Middle-West.
There in the midst of the despised "foreigners" his sympathetic understanding of their problems and his practical attempts to solve them made his mission bountiful in good works. At a meeting of the Old Catholic clergy in Chicago on January 7, 1917, when the Old Catholic Constitution was formally adopted and incorporated under the name of "The Catholic Church of North America (The Old Catholic Church in America)" Bishop Francis was elected Archbishop and the Metropolitan American See was established. In 1913, Bishop Mathew consecrated H.R.H. Rudolph Francis Edward Hamilton de Lorraine-Brabant, the Prince de Landes Berghes to the episcopacy. The Prince Bishop established the ministry of the Old Catholic Church in the United States in 1914 when he migrated to North America in order to avoid the difficulties of World War I.
Bishop de Landes Berghes consecrated to the episcopacy, Fr. Carmel Henry
Carfora, an Italian Franciscan Friar October 4th, 1916. Bishop Carfora was
elected to succeed Bishop de Landes Berghes as Archbishop of the Old Roman
Catholic Diocese of America and is responsible for organization of the North
American Old Roman Catholic Church. This was a sister jurisdiction to the
Old Catholic Church already established in America and sprang from the same
Old Catholic Apostolic heritage, history and vision. During Bishop
Carfora's tenure, the church expanded greatly across the United States and
Canada.
On August the 15th, 1943, Archbishop Carmel Henry Carfora consecrated Frederick Littler Pyman as Bsihop. On October 22, 1945 Bishop Pyman was given authority as Regionary Bishop for the Western States Regionary Diocese, for the Old Roman Catholic Church in North America.
By 1947 Bishop Pyman had come to the sad conclusion, that due to lax incorporation laws, bishops who did not have valid canonical authorization or authority to use the Old Roman Catholic corporation name had sized it and now held corporate seniority. Given that sad state of affairs, he then petitioned Archbishop Carfora and the Synod of Bishops to allow him to establish in the Western States - "The Evangelical Orthodox (Old Catholic) Church in America."
Bishop Pyman's vision was to once again renew the ministry outreach and
work of unity initiated by the late Archbishop Arnold Harris Mathew when
he had joined in communion and union with his Eminence the Most Reverend
Archbishop Gearrasimos Messara of Beirut, Syria, on August 5th, 1911, by
receiving Archbishop Mathew and the Old Catholics under Archbishop Mathew
into union and full communion with the Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch.
This historic vision of maintaining and growing both the Old Catholic
Church witness and recalling and preserving the historic union with Orthodoxy
and its rich Faith, prompted Bishop Pyman's petition for an "apostolic mandate"
for the establishment of the Evangelical Orthodox (Catholic) Church and
its ministry and labor in behalf of our Lord Jesus Christ. This apostolic
mandate was granted by Archbishop Carfora and the Holy Synod of Bishops
in 1947. Archbishop Carmel Henry Carfora served as Archbishop Primate of
"The Evangelical Orthodox Catholic Church in America" until his death
in 1958, at which time Bishop Pyman became the 2nd Primus. On June
29th, 1974 following the synodical election and issuance of a "Protocol of
Election," Perry Ronald (Joseph Benedict) Sills was consecrated by Bishop
Frederick Littler Pyman as Coadjutor Bishop to succeed him as Primus. Assisting
and co-consecrating with Bishop Pyman were: Bishop Basil of the Free Serbian
Orthodox Church in Exile, Bishop William Littlewood, and Bishop Lawrence
Shaver. Bishop Sills was enthroned at Saint Monica's Church in Cupertino,
California by Bishop Pyman on the Sunday following his consecration to the
episcopate on June 30th, 1974.
The Evangelical Orthodox Catholic Church in America continues that self-same
witness in the spirit of ecumenical (Old) Catholicism to this every day. It's
vision is to be evangelical in the proclamation of the Gospel of our Lord,
Savior and God Jesus Christ. Orthodox in adhering to the Faith of the undivided
- one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. Catholic in maintaining the
universal witness of the Orthodox and Catholic Faith as handed down to us
from the apostles and the Fathers of the Church who have gone before us.
That same vision encompasses a loving and accepting grouping of faith communities
by following the teachings of our Lord, Savior and God Jesus Christ; honoring
the dignity and equality of each person; and restoring the Spirit in an authentic
Orthodox and Old Catholic tradition. We seek to make the richness of Catholic
spirituality and tradition available and accessible to the many people who
for some reason have felt excluded from other churches, for whatever reason.
As the Old Catholic Church Movement combines the tradition of the great
spiritual leaders of the latter ages of the Christian Church it has also
effectively united the factors in Catholic Christendom that Hague untiringly
labored to preserve the first administrative principles of the Apostolic
Church-to hold in violate "the faith once for all delivered to the Saints."
The undaunted spirits of the great Christian revolutionaries, the Port Royalists,
the so-called Jansenists, the Mariavites and many others have served to prove
by their struggle against ecclesiastical intolerance and pharaseeism, that
in every age within the church they loved, the same struggle has been manifest
in the lives of but a handful of people at al times.
While the torch they carried from age to age may have been dimmed at times
but it has always been carried forward, never dropped, never entirely extinguished.
Today their efforts are merged in handfuls of many people in almost every
part of the world to whom the sympathetic hands of the great Oriental Christian
Church lends strength
.
Added to the growing Old Catholic Church movement in America were the independent
Portuguese Catholics under the Rt. Reverend Bishop Antonio Rodriguez of
Massachusetts in 1917 and the appointment of the Rt. Reverend Joseph
Zielonka of New Jersey, after his reception into union with several Polish
congregations in 1924. The joint Encyclical the Old Catholic Bishops in America
in 1925, in which an outline of a really Christian society was advocated,
met with such approval by representatives of the Eastern Orthodox Church
that the Metropolitan John Bienipotentiary-Delegate of the Holy Synod, of
Russia, representing 127 Bishops and Archbishops in Russia, received the
Old Catholic Church in America into union with that body in the same year.
In 1933, under an agreement jointly entered into, the Orthodox Archbishop
of Prague and Czechoslovakia, Servitors, under the Orthodox Patriarch of
Constantinople, placed the Orthodox Czechoslovaks in America under the jurisdiction
of the American Old Catholic Archbishop while at the same time Servitors
was named Protector of the Old Catholics in Czechoslovakia.
Thus with a threefold rapprochement with the church of the East a practical
and organized unity of a great part of Catholic Christendom has been realized
by Old Catholics under a program inaugurated by Archbishop Mathew of England
in 1910. Underlying the terms of this union are the fundamental principles
of the Old Catholicism. An acceptance of the doctrinal points of unity prevailing
in the undivided Christian Church prior to the year 1054 A.D., i.e., a belief
in Seven Sacraments and in the dogmatic Decrees of the Seven Ecumenical
Councils.
Thus the various Old Catholic Churches in America though autonomous and
self governing, are by their own synod of bishops gathered in various synods
all around the U.S., a spiritual part of the Old Catholic Church, through
and by faith and heritage within the Western world and the great Orthodox
Church of the East, and are united in witness of the faith of the first century
Christian fellowship and differing only in the language and customs of its
different units and locations.
To read more information concerning the Jurisdiction of The Evangelical
Orthodox Catholic Church in America, you may select a page to jump
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