Posted on 05/22/2014 3:22:11 AM PDT by markomalley
And P.S. – You’re not a priest.
That pretty much sums up Bishop Paprocki’s response to a local Catholic woman’s recent attempt to get ordained.
The woman in question is Mary F. Keldermans of Springfield. Bishop Paprocki wrote to her last month asking her to reconsider her plan, but evidently she ignored him and tried to be ordained a priest at a Unitarian church on May 5.
Bishop Paprocki promptly issued a decree of excommunication (and if you’ve never seen one of those before, they look like this).
The bishop also issued this statement to his diocese:
Please be advised that Ms. Mary F. Keldermans of Springfield, Illinois, has attempted to be ordained a priest for “Roman Catholic Womenpriests, Inc.” in a ceremony at the Abraham Lincoln Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Springfield on May 5, 2014. As a result, she has incurred an automatic excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.
That is what you call a bishop who’s not afraid to bishop.
At the same time, we should be careful not to tout this as some sort of righteous smack-down or triumphant display of authority. Bishop Paprocki is much too holy and charitable a bishop for that, and I have no doubt that his declaration of excommunication was issued with sorrow, not pleasure.
But he didn’t hold back from issuing the decree of excommunication either, or from publishing it prominently on the diocesan website.
This is one of the things I love about Bishop Paprocki. Whether it’s standing up for the unborn, for marriage, or for Holy Orders, he doesn’t shy away from confronting those who threaten his flock, nor from explaining his position to them with charity.
He prays intensely, he acts decisively, and he teaches clearly.
Lord, send us more bishops like this one!
LOL!
Good one!
Now THAT was funny! :)
Thanks for clarifying. I knew all of these points except the abolishment of the office by the pope.
Isn't that something you get at Starbucks?
A thoughtful latte?
The neo-Confederates claim that Puritanism is responsible for contemporary liberalism (as did their Confederate forebears), and plenty of "palaeoconservatives" think the Left is a front for old Boston money.
Unitarians are a Marxist sect that invite people to speak like sandanista guerrillas. An old college acquaintance who leans way left, brags about how his ‘Religion’ is out to take out capitalism.
It depends on the "congregation" and the minister. I was in the seminary with one of their ministers and he was uber conservative. there were several of us that had dinner together several times a week and he was always one of the strongest conservative voices.
Robert H. W. Welch Jr., the founder of the John Birch Society, was a Unitarian. He was also an evolutionist and, according to at least one former JBS author, opposed to the death penalty.
Sin separates us from God yes and ruptures our communion with the Church. But the Church is the hospital for sinners to use the language of Pope Francis. So when we sin, we are informally excommunicating ourselves. Formal public excommunications are the result of heresy and attacking the Doctrine of the Church, which is what this woman did, what she is doing is mocking the Doctrine and setting up her own false religious system. That is heretical and can lead people away from the true Faith. In is in those situations that a formal excommunication is issued. Now, are there cases that warrant it in addition to this one, yes, this nun Sr. Jeane Gramerick[spelling], who use to run this group called new ways Ministry, and she was censored for that, recently stated Obama should use taxpayer money to pay for oversea abortions. That is a challenge to the Doctrine of the Catholic Church. In my view, and I am no theologian or trained canon lawyer, that could/should warrant excommunication unless she publicly recants.
My understanding is that the sin of abortion is reserved to the local Bishop, if a priest hears it in confession he will ask the woman to return after he has gotten leave from the bishop to absolve. The procedure varies by diocese.
**(as all Catholic clergy are priests, as you probably know)**
Clergy are deacons, priests and bishops.
Deacons are not priests.
That is what I was waiting for.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latae_sententiae
LOL!
An excommunicated latte?
I’ve forgotten what “sententious” means, but it looks a little like “sedentary.”
I suppose it makes sense that things got this way. The Puritans where all about reading and interpreting the Bible for yourself. The trouble with that, as Catholics (Roman and Anglo) often maintained is that without interpretation by properly trained, disciplined and accredited clergy, laymen will eventually twist and pervert the scripture to make it support anything they want it to based on whatever is fashionable at the time...
And yet the clergy of the ancient hierarchical churches are now far, far, FAR to the Left of Primitive Baptists.
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