The following open letter was sent this morning to bishops of the United States. The Lepanto Institute has created a web page with a sample letter that concerned parishioners can send to their bishops, asking them to ban the AUSCP from their diocese and forbid their priests from being members. NOTE THIS WELL – Call to Action and the succeeding decades of liturgical abuse and heresy could have been stopped, dead in their tracks if we had the ability to conduct this kind of research and get the word out as quickly as we can now. We have an opportunity here to stop what will in all likelihood become “Call to Action: Round 2” by stopping the AUSCP. Please contact your local bishop and ask him to banish AUSCP from your diocese. Here again is the link to the sample letter.
Dear Eminences and Excellencies,
Since last November, the Lepanto Institute has been investigating and reporting on the actions and goals of an organization of priests called the Association of United States Catholic Priests (AUSCP). What we have discovered is that this organization of priests, which claims to be “the largest association of priests in the United States,” is:
- promoting women’s ordination to the diaconate (with eyes on the priestly ordination of women),
- homosexuality,
- priestless parishes,
- married priests,
- and a host of other heterodox positions.
In addition to this, we found that the AUSCP is acting in concert with heretical and condemned entities, such as New Ways Ministry, Dignity USA, FutureChurch, and the International Church Reform Network (ICRN). AUSCP was even instrumental in helping the dissident Fr. Helmut Schuller find a speaking venue, contravening the expressed wishes of Cardinal O’Malley, Archbishop Chaput, and Archbishop Vigneron, who banned him from speaking in their respective dioceses.
Two weeks ago, I personally went to Albuquerque, NM to observe the AUSCP as it held its annual assembly there. In addition to the common sight of these priests wearing rainbow pins on their lanyards and seeing the plethora of pro-homosexual literature proliferating the exhibition hall, I was able to sit in on a keynote address delivered by Fr. Richard Rohr, who denied the inerrancy of Scripture, denied the infallibility of the Pope, and claimed that Christianity was a “religion of white privilege.”
Your Eminences and Excellencies, the AUSCP is an organization which poses a clear and present danger to the faith and to the faithful. I bring this information to your attention because they are a growing threat to the faith and to your flock, and their members are likely already present in your diocese. If you examine this organization on your own, I am confident you will see that this is an organization that should be banned and membership forbidden.
Please know that we pray sincerely and earnestly for all of you every day.
Sincerely yours in Christ,
Michael Hichborn
President, Lepanto Institute
Reports on the AUSCP:
- AUSCP’s Plan for Ordained Women and Priestless parishes
- AUSCP’ Idea for Priestly Formation and Info on Conference speakers
- AUSCP’s Desire to Obtain Funding from Unsuspecting, Pew-sitting Catholics
- AUSCP’s Membership in an International Network of Heretical Organizations
- AUSCP’s Alliance with Heretical, Pro-Sodomy Organizations
- AUSCP’s Keynote Address from Notorious Priest, Fr. Richard Rohr
- AUSCP’s Vision of the Church in Relation to the Vision of Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich
Thank you for the good work you do!
Thank you, Michael, for doing the footwork for the faithful that are being led by wolves I robes.
Thank you, I’ve sent a copy of the letter to my bishop, praying the diocese rejects their heresies.
In what way are married priests heterodox? Perhaps outside of the Roman tradition, but it was widespread in the East and West for at least the first millennia, and is common in the East still today.
Research the differences between East and West, and why the West chose celibacy. You will have your answer.
In the old time, priests were married but more and more priests opted to follow Christ as celibate then it became a norm in the church. There was a study on this. Check on the Synod of Elvira. This was in 305. I might be wrong but this was the start of celibacy. Pope John II I think said that it is the jewel of the church. If you can see the history of western church, the Catholic Church, it flourished tremendously due to the sacrifice of our priests who have chosen the path of our Blessed Lord, to give everything for His glory. The current crisis is not about celibacy as this is men to men/child-boy. Priesthood has become a job instead of missionary work for the glory of our Lord. Those who are faithful to the gospel always chose celibacy as they wanted to give 100% to God.
During the period of the Old Covenant, Clergy serving in the Temple, lived in the Priest’s quarters at the Temple, leaving their wives at home so they could concentrate fully on the their Sacred, Priestly duties. Celibacy was enforced then as well.
However, due to the fact that their were many more Priests during that period than there serving Our Lord today, it was not needed for them to be called to service regularly – Their Priestly service was restricted to a few months at a time every couple of years.
For interest, read Our Lord’s words to St Catherine of Siena on the topic at this link – the relevant paragraph is found within Book 7 Chapter 10
http://www.saintsbooks.net/books/St.%20Bridget%20(Birgitta)%20of%20Sweden%20-%20Prophecies%20and%20Revelations.html
Thank you for this information. The celibate priesthood was quite clearly intended by Christ from the beginning for the kingdom of God, to be a sign of contradiction to the world. The Bible informs us that the apostles left their nets and families in order to follow Christ. “And going on from thence, he saw other two brethren, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in a ship with Zebedee their father, mending their nets: and he called them. And they forthwith left their nets and father, and followed him.” Matthew 4:18-22 (Also Mark 1:16-20 “And Peter began to say unto Him: Behold, we have left all things, and have followed Thee. Jesus answering, said: Amen I say to you, there is no man who hath left house or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or children, or lands, for My sake and for the gospel. Who shall not receive a hundred times as much, now in this time; houses, and brethren and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come life everlasting.” Mark 10:28-30.
If a married man were to be ordained his wife would also have to agree to a life of celibacy. And children would need a means of support since a priest is not a wage-earner. The celibate life of the priest and religious is a tremendous gift to the Church and to the world, and is especially important for today’s world.
We need holy boldness in the Catholic church.
Nothing will be done. The Vatican ii religion doesn’t really care.
Even worse is having the Cardinal who runs your archdiocese (like mine) who is a leader of AUSCP and gives money to it. This open letter is absolutely useless. What’s needed is prayer and fasting.
You are right. Nothing will be done …. if we do not stand up for our Faith! The crisis that our faith finds itself in now has happened, in various ways, numerous times in our two thousand year history. Because the laity and clergy responded to those crises each time they occurred, our Faith survived and grew. The Martyrs past and present knew this. All the Pope saints knew this. St Thomas Aquinas knew this. Now it is our turn. We need to let the Bishops know about this group. Send your letter, pull out your rosary, and get busy. Pray for the conversion of this group or the demise of this misguided organization.
Our faith has been bombarded for awhile now. The faithful don’t expect this to come from “inside” the church. God bless us all
I would love to send a letter to my Bishop concerning the AUSCP, but unfortunately I live in the Diocese of San Diego and my Bishop is Robert McElroy. Enough said. May Jesus and Mary come to our aid, Amen.
I completely understand your concern. It would be good for you to send him a letter anyway, for a couple of reasons: 1) It would be good to see how he responds, and 2) after attempting to send him your concerns, and he ignores them, you can begin to build a file to send to the Vatican’s Congregation for Bishops, which is headed by Cdl. Sarah.
Thank you for your work on behalf of souls.
Dear Michael do you know if they are in Australia? There is a conference this year in Australia where they have a speaker from City Life Church a woman and I wrote to my Bishop asking if the Catholic church can’t produce their own inspirational speaker the reply I received ignored the question. The conference is about asking people in and outside the church where they want the church to go into the future. REALLY? I thought the church belongs to Jesus and only He can change it.
Yours in Christ Marianne
Hi Marianne,
In Australia, you’ll want to keep your eye on the National Council of Priests, Australia (http://nationalcouncilofpriests.com.au/), which is on the organizing steering committee of the International Catholic Priests Movement and Reform Groups. To give you an idea of how bad it is, here is a post about their stated key issues in October 2016: “The group called for progress on: full equality for women in the Church; rights for LGBT Catholics; fundamental rights for all Catholics; and developing emerging models of parish ministry such as the Bishop Fritz Lobinger model.” https://www.futurechurch.org/press-releases/international-catholic-priest-movements-and-reform-groups-urge-church-progress-on-0
How I wish that I could send a copy of your letter to the Bishop of my Diocese informing him about the heterodox goings on at the AUSCP but unfortunately I live in San Diego and the Bishop of my Diocese is Robert McElroy – enough said?
The only thing that I can do is to pray for you and the wonderful work you are doing.
Is this happening in other countries to?? UK ? New Zealand???
Organizations like FutureChurch, We Are Church, and the Association of Catholic Priests in Ireland are active in the UK. We are not certain about New Zealand, but we can look.
I personally believe that were it not for apostolates and , in particular, men and women like Michael Hitchborn and Michael Voris and all their associates who have made it a life’s work for God to track heterodoxy in Holy Mother Church, evil and corruption throughout would have completely overtaken Truth. These courageous faithful souls have fallen in direct line with Saints of the Church throughout Her history who sacrificed their very lives in martyrdom to keep Truth in front of those who would destroy Her. When they shoulder heroic Truth face-to-face, these kinds of souls always win in a stare-down with Satan, for God has promised it. Thank you so much for helping us out here find our own courage to face the battlefield-moments that can become seminal in own lives. Love you all so much!
The enemy is working hard, but Jesus our savior has the last word! Praise his name!
Amen!
Although the letter to the bishops may end up in some diocese trashcan the effort has to be made and hopefully some traction made against the heterodox which AUSCP is attempting to promulgate. Lepanto, Church Militant, Catholic Thing, The Remnant, Lifesite and to some extent First Things are all fighting the good fight which we as the Church Militant on earth must also take up “arms”!
Greetings Michael, is there any organization similar to the AUSCP in Canada that we should be aware of ? Thank you for your diligence on all things Catholics.
Hi Marilyne,
Here is a site that has a list of organizations to watch out for. Included on it are some in Canada. http://www.catholicchurchreform.com/reformGroups.html
I will send the letter to Cardinal Dolan. Good luck to me. I will do my part, let God take care of the rest, and I know He will, in His own perfect time, His own perfect way.
A high profile person from behind the scenes is pulling the strings. That’s why they (AUSCP) do what they do with impunity. Nobody cares about the Burkes and the Sarahs. (Cardinals).
Is there any way to find out if my parish priest is a member of AUSP? Fr. Rohr is a favorite of his, and generally speaking my priest expresses faith of rebellion.
AUSCP doesn’t publish its list of members, so determining whether specific priests are members or not is difficult. You could ask directly, but if he is, and doesn’t want you to know, he might just lie about it.
This is very disturbing in all of it’s ways. God help us all.
Nice photo of Fr. Tuck Grinnell with the AUSCP program. He’s been a longtime dissenter and community organizer in the Diocese Arlington. He recently was allowed to retire early and works with the Alinsky group VOICE (Virginians Organized for Interfaith Community Engagement) so I expect he will be having jolly good fun “making a mess” of the community in northern Virginia. He’ll be living at the priests’ retirement home. I know at least one good priest there so I’m praying he’ll have a good impact on Fr. Tuck.
Bishop Burbidge should be made aware, as well as Father Scalia.
I know Archbishop Wester was the Bishop in Utah up until a couple of years ago so I would imagine this group is in Utah, right?
It is no wonder that those going through the RCIA program are being given a watered down insight to our religion. They are not even being given the catechism.
I would imagine this group is in Utah as archbishop Wester was a bishop here up until a couple years ago.
This explains why those going through the RCIA programs are not given the catechism, instead are given a watered down version of our faith and unfortunately with many errors.
Thank you for your good work and God bless you.
Thank you, Michael (and Michael Voris) for your campaign to expose the “Evil Moral Rot” that has apparently quite successfully infiltrated our Catholic Church at all levels. What can we, the Faithful do to add our voices to the outcry for them to ALL BE SWEPT OUT of our Church!! We can not bury our heads in the sand and hope that this will all just “blow over” which seems to be the current policy of the Pope, Cardinals and Bishops. Those who have committed this great sin against Jesus Christ and His flock MUST GO – ALL OF THEM. Holy Mother of God pray for us. St. Michael the Arch Angel protect us in this battle for our faith.