From the Ordinary
Eastertide 2025

Another jurisdiction in the world of Old Catholicism... "What a surprise," one may think, and rightly so. A simple look at our tradition in the United States and British Commonwealth nations reveal significant fractures and inspire perhaps an ultimate question of why all the Old Catholics seem to exist. 

This is a question I have wrestled with for the past several months in prayerfully considering my next steps in episcopal ministry. There is clearly no need for another Old Catholic diocese, sponsoring parish churches - they are plenteous, and they have their own emphases which often do not include the promotion, development, and strengthening of non-traditional ministries. Chaplains and other community ministers often find themselves misunderstood or underserved in such communities, not necessarily out of any ill-will, but out of a lack of understanding on the part of their bishops and diocesan leadership of what professional, non-parochial ministry looks like.

The Old Catholic Ordinariate for Specialized Ministries - U.S.A. is in formation, not to replicate a traditional diocese, but to provide a jurisdiction that allows for those serving in non-traditional ministries to receive the support they need to allow their ministries to grow and flourish while remaining under apostolic oversight. This allows the ministries and clergy of the Ordinariate to fulfil the needs of those in their communities who might otherwise never darken the door of the Church.

This approach to ministry was recently confirmed for me as I was reading a blog post that stated, "The roots of Old Catholicism are discovered in serving those that the church simply ignored." Archbishop Joseph René Vilatte, an early American leader in the Old Catholic tradition, found himself disillusioned with institutional rigidity. As a result, he sought to promote a more pastoral form of Catholicism in North America shaped, as Father Brett Banks writes in the current issue of Extraordinary Catholics!, "by conscience, community and the deep dignity of all believers." 

It is in this spirit that our Ordinariate is rooted, and it is our pledge to be present on the margins of the Church, so that - inasmuch as possible - those who find themselves in need in our communities will have ministries standing ready to serve them so that they will never again associate being ignored with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.