Old Catholic Church in America
| Old Catholic Church of America | |||
 Old Catholic Church of America |
|||
| Founder | Bishop Paul Francis Cope | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Date Founded | 1925 | ||
| Recognition | Recognizes the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church as valid.
Recognizes the sacraments of the Eastern and Oriental churches as valid. |
||
| Primate | Archbishop Charles Walders | ||
| Headquarters | Westfield, Wisconsin | ||
| Territorial Jurisdiction | Parishes in the United States (3) | ||
| Clergy | 2 bishops, 3 priests/deacons | ||
| Liturgical Language | English, Latin | ||
| Adherents | Less than 10,000 worldwide | ||
| Website | http://www.oldcatholic.org/index.htm | ||
Recognizes the sacraments of the Eastern and Oriental churches as valid.
The Old Catholic Church of America is an Old Catholic church founded in the United States in 1925 by Bishop Paul Francis Cope. It was founded and incorporated in 1941 by Francis Xavier Resch. Previously called the Archdiocese of the Old Catholic Church in America the name was subsequently changed to the Old Catholic Church in America. The Old Catholic Church of America retains pre-Vatican II liturgical and doctrinal traditions. It is not a member of, or in full communion with, the Union of Utrecht of the Old Catholic Churches.
Resch separated from the North American Old Roman Catholic Church, after being made a bishop of that church by its leader Carmel Henry Carfora. He started his own church, the Diocese of Kankakee, which was centered on the site of his parish in Kankakee, Illinois. The new church quickly grew to establish other parishes in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin. These parishes, largely consisting of first generation immigrants from Eastern Europe, became inactive as the children of the congregants adjusted to life in America.
In 1963, Resch made Walter X. Brown a bishop. Brown would later succeed Resch as the archbishop of the church. He was responsible for moving the church's headquarters to Milwaukee, where it now has a seminary and maintains a number of charitable organizations. It also maintains a monastery in the Franciscan tradition in Chicago, and two monastic communities in Milwaukee, one following the Eastern tradition and one following the Western tradition.
...
Wikipedia