Anglican Ordinariate Priest Excommunicated and Parish Closed After Criticism of Conciliar Popes [Chu

Discussion in 'Anglican and Christian News' started by World Press, Jul 21, 2019.

  1. World Press

    World Press Active Member

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    Anglican Ordinariate Priest Excommunicated and Parish Closed After Criticism of Conciliar Popes

    2019-07-08_Fr._Vaughn_Treco.png

    by Stephen Wynne • ChurchMilitant.com • July 8, 2019

    MINNEAPOLIS (ChurchMilitant.com) - A priest of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter has been excommunicated, and his parish permanently closed, months after he criticized certain actions of various popes both during and after the Second Vatican Council.

    On April 1, Bp. Steven J. Lopes announced he had issued a decree of excommunication against Fr. Vaughn Treco, pastor of St. Bede the Venerable in suburban Minneapolis, citing "rejection of the magisterial authority of an Ecumenical Council and a series of popes."

    The charge stems from a homily Fr. Treco delivered on Nov. 25, 2018, the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe.

    Titled "The Father's Grapes and the Children's Teeth," the address was based on Ezekiel 18:2, which declares: "The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the teeth of the children are set on edge."

    In his homily, Fr. Treco identified multiple roots of the current Church crisis — faulting missteps and failures of popes during and after Vatican II — and outlined an appropriate Catholic response.

    On June 28, when asked about allegations that he denied Vatican II and supported a sedevacantist position, Fr. Treco told Church Militant: "Thank you for asking this question of me directly. In answer, I can say without any dissimulation that I have never denied the validity of the Second Vatican Council, and I do not now believe, nor have I ever believed that the Apostolic See is vacant."



    The first signs of trouble came on Dec. 11, when Fr. Treco was contacted by Ordinariate Vicar General Fr. Timothy Perkins. Father Perkins denounced the homily as tantamount to heresy and ordered Treco to fly to Texas for a meeting with Bp. Steven J. Lopes, head of the Personal Ordinariate.

    The following day, Fr. Treco met with Bp. Lopes, Vicar General Perkins and Fr. Richard Kramer, director of vocations at the Ordinariate's Houston chancery...

    "I was asked if I believed that the Popes John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I, John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Francis were legitimate popes," he said. "Quite honestly, I was taken completely off-guard by the question. It seemed to be quite unrelated to anything that had been said in the meeting thus far, and I was surprised because the question was completely unrelated to the substance of my homily."

    "Even so," he added, "I affirmed without hesitation that I believed that Popes John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I, John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Francis were each validly elected successors of St. Peter."

    For his part, Bp. Lopes expressed surprise that Fr. Treco had not come to the meeting with a letter of resignation.

    I will recant anything that was wrong to state as I remain faithful to the Church and Magisterium.

    In spite of Fr. Treco's pledges of fidelity, Bp. Lopes dismissed his personal profession of faith, accusing the priest of fomenting schism within the Church. As Fr. Treco and his backers point out, the bishop has refused to specify how and where in his homily Fr. Treco incited schism, noting that instead, Lopes has lobbed accusations only in general terms...

    On Jan. 29, Bp. Lopes suspended Fr. Treco for "having committed the delict of schism." On April 1, Bp. Lopes notified priests of the Ordinariate that Fr. Treco had been formally excommunicated for his criticism of the conciliar popes...

    The congregation's letter went unanswered. But on May 6, 2019, it was announced that St. Bede the Venerable would be shut down. The final Mass was celebrated on May 19.


    Click here for the rest of the article:
    https://www.churchmilitant.com/news...ish-closed-after-criticism-of-conciliar-popes
     
  2. Eieren

    Eieren New Member

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    Wow.

    Another example of the sociological principle whereby newcomers are not allowed to do anything but praise and express highest gratitude to those who deigned to let them join.

    Also, it's clear that many in the Ordinariate are more traditional and conservative than many Romans, and many Romans hate them for it.

    Or, as I thought while sitting in a liturgical theology class taught by an elderly SJ, "Vatican 2 is strong with that one."

    I don't know if a "regular" RCC priest would get away with that sermon. I suspect many know better than to even try it.

    Sadly, I've seen this happen also in the Orthodox-WR. If you don't toe the line perfectly, you're quick to be spat out. It gets really quite ridiculous.
     
  3. anglican74

    anglican74 Well-Known Member Anglican

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    I have known so many conservative Anglicans that swam the tiber imagining they'd find a safer home AND retain their Anglican patrimony (they never did explain to me how the latter could ever be possible in the long term)...

    Well I guess this proves it and didn't even take that long in the first place :o No Anglican patrimony, and an excommunication to boot!!
     
  4. Shane R

    Shane R Well-Known Member

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    I don't think side of the Ordinariate equation had a strong idea of what 'Anglican patrimony' was. For them, it's a meaningless word that allowed the faithful to feel as though were keeping something important.
     
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  5. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    A friend of mine was drawn that way, and came to understand it to be not enough of either (neither fish nor fowl) and so moved on to have a much bigger look at SSPX. He is now looking at Russian Orthodoxy.

    Here the one Church of Jesus Christ is said to subsist in the Catholic Church: although many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside of its visible structure, these elements, as gifts belonging to the Church of Christ, are forces impelling toward catholic unity. There is an inner dynamic in the life and teaching of Anglicanism which continues to draw Anglicans to its source. The Personal Ordinariate is Pope Benedict XVI’s response to “this holy desire.”
    https://ordinariate.net/patrimony

    Faith is a journey. All that was true at first is true at last, but there is no way back into the past but through the future, there, if anywhere, the miracle must happen. Alpha and Omega, as we hear the words of the Holy Gospel, so we encounter Jesus, and we must recognise in that encounter is the source of life, healing and salvation, and indeed here in Jesus is the very source of the institutional expression of what we know as Church.
     
  6. Shane R

    Shane R Well-Known Member

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    I meant to write -either- side of the equation. The Anglicans that were drawn represented a particular fringe and the Roman Catholics drawing them didn't understand them.
     
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  7. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    I don't think the rcc will ever understand Anglicans. I also have a feeling that numbers of Anglicans who want to swim the Tiber, or even just halfway to the Ordinariate Island, often have some idealistic view of the rcc as the the panacea for all that see see as the problems of Anglicanism. There is no perfect Church this side of heaven.
     
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  8. Liturgyworks

    Liturgyworks Well-Known Member Anglican

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    If the Ordinariate fell under the auspices of the Congregation Ecclesia Dei this would not have happened.
     
  9. Liturgyworks

    Liturgyworks Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Priests in the FSSP, the Priestly Confraternity of Christ the King, Sovereign Priest and other Tridentine Mass groups under Ecclesia Dei get away with such statements routinely, as well as clergy under conservative bishops that support the Traditional Latin Mass. The excellent website New Liturgical Movement provides information on that,

    In the latter case, I have heard no complaints of that happening; the only major kerfluffle was when Bishop Jerome Shaw and his Archpriest were retired, but not deposed, excommunicated or liturgically incapacitated, after His Grace ordained a group of prospective priests on Corpus Christi, a holiday ROCOR disagrees with and a practice they disagree with, despite having been repeatedly told not to. The priests in question were largely reordained individually.

    That said, I would prefer a restoration of full communion to the Western Rite, or rather, J see the Western Rite as something to be used for the conversion of Roman Catholics and Lutherans.
     
  10. Stalwart

    Stalwart Well-Known Member Anglican

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    They used to. Once Francis came into office, all such talk became quickly suppressed, and you simply don't have even trad RCC priests criticising what's going on.

    The SSPX used to be extremely fiery (10+ years ago), even to the extent of denying all post 1969 ordinations. However in their recent decisions and politics has become completely pacified and domesticated. They're trying to become a mainstream RCC order, and has never in the last 6 years made a comment against Pope Francis, when they routinely used to lambast the (much milder) heresies of John Paul II.
     
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  11. Liturgyworks

    Liturgyworks Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Pope Francis is an intolerable tyrant.
     
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  12. A Garden Gnome

    A Garden Gnome Member

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    Can you elaborate? What makes him worse than any other recent pope's in your opinion?
     
  13. Liturgyworks

    Liturgyworks Well-Known Member Anglican

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    His theological liberalism, his relentless and dogged persecution of traditionalists in the Roman church, his intentional misquoting of Orthodox canon law on divorces re: Amoris Laetitia, and his personality cult. One nice thing about Pope Benedict XVI is, like any decent monastic, he never attempted to be popular for the sake of popularity.
     
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  14. Shane R

    Shane R Well-Known Member

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    I saw a recent quote from Bishop Lopes that was very telling. I can't find it today but I'll paraphrase to the best of my recollection. He described the Ordinariate faithful as liturgy snobs and well to do liberals (the old Episcopalian crowd no doubt) who need to be made uncomfortable and shaken up a bit. One wonders how much longer he can last in his role since coming to understand his constituents in this way.
     
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  15. Stalwart

    Stalwart Well-Known Member Anglican

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    To me, one of the most interesting things about the Ordinariate is that until being recently appointed a bishop, the whole US “diocese” was run by a priest. Fr Stenton I think his name. Namely, a priest had been given an episcopal jurisdiction. This mirrors the other situations like when the Pope gave priests the faculty to conduct ordinations:
    https://forums.anglican.net/threads/roman-catholicism-denying-that-episcopacy-as-a-separate-order-basically-presbyterianism.4192/

    Which underscores my point that there is no episcopacy in the Roman church, properly speaking. In effect there is only one bishop for the whole world, the bishop of Rome. He has the sole ordinary jurisdiction of the whole world, and sends out his emissaries (sometimes dressing them up in a bishop’s outfit). His priests can ordain, confirm, run dioceses. It’s the same theology as presbyterianism.
     
  16. Shane R

    Shane R Well-Known Member

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    Jeffrey Steenson was the first ordinary for the ordinariate. He had previously been a TEC bishop. He was granted the highest rank of monsignor (I didn't know they were ranked) but could not be a Roman bishop because he is married.
     
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  17. PDL

    PDL Well-Known Member Anglican

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    I see the original story in the OP of this thread has never been followed up. We don't know the full story. If Bishop Lopes excommunicated Fr. Treco the latter would have the right to appeal his case to the Holy See. I wonder if he did this.
     
  18. Shane R

    Shane R Well-Known Member

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    I can't figure out where Fr. Treco went but the Ordinariate is not growing in the US.
     
  19. Rexlion

    Rexlion Well-Known Member

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    I recall my mother (when I was young) speaking of a monsignor in a hushed, awed tone. To her, a monsignor was an exceptionally holy man by reason of his office.
     
  20. PDL

    PDL Well-Known Member Anglican

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    I see the original story in the OP of this thread has never been followed up. We don't know the full story. If Bishop Lopes excommunicated Fr. Treco the latter would have the right to appeal his case to the Holy See. I wonder if he did this.