Rochester, New York's Father Callan and all of his followers have been kicked out of the Catholic Church, but he's not worried - just call them "the other white meat." Gay-friendly Roman Catholic priest Father Jim Callan, already suspended from his duties and removed from Rochester, New York's Corpus Christi Church, has now been excommunicated, the Diocese of Rochester announced in a statement February 24. Actually, the diocese's statement said that, "Father Callan has effectively excommunicated himself." The excommunication means that Callan cannot legitimately participate in any of the sacraments even as a layperson, until such time as his bishop may choose to lift it. The only further disciplinary step would be to dismiss Callan from the priesthood, which Bishop of Rochester Matthew Clark is reluctant to petition for, and which only the Vatican would be able to undo. Yet Callan remains defiant: he told the "Rochester Democrat and Chronicle" that, "I d! on't believe in excommunication. I believe in including people. That is what the universal church is supposed to be about."
Although previous complaints against Callan had included his celebration of gay and lesbian unions, having women play a significant role on the altar, and allowing non-Catholics to partake of communion, the diocese based the excommunication on his causing a schism by starting a new church. That refers to more than 1,000 Corpus Christi congregants who followed their priest after his removal from that pulpit, to attend worship services he's been performing in local Protestant churches since October; the diocese has also declared them excommunicated. Many of those parishioners participated in a series of assorted demonstrations and actions protesting Callan's removal and suspension. During his 22-year tenure at Corpus Christi, Callan is credited with having taken the dying parish of about 200 and not only revitalizing it into one of 3,000, but making it one which has created ministries recognized as models across the nation. Since Callan's removal, Corpus Christi's attenda! nce is down to less than 1,000.
As has been the case for the last six months, Callan believes the latest order to act against him originated in the Vatican, where local conservative Catholics have been taking complaints about him for years. However, Bishop Clark has again claimed full responsibility. Clark himself has taken considerable criticism for welcoming conferences of ministries to gays and lesbians and holding masses for them.
Although the diocese is giving every signal that Callan and his congregants would be welcomed back into the fold -- diocesan chancellor Kevin McKenna said, "We continue to pray for Father Callan and his followers to return to the church" -- he has no intention of changing his practices of the last decade. He told the "New York Times" that, "I was kind of hoping they wouldn't do this because it looks bad for them, but as far as I'm concerned, this doesn't affect me, and I don't think it affects most of the other people either." He also said, "We're excited. It helps us a little bit because we've been not celebrating Masses all this time. We've been holding communion services with preconsecrated hosts, just to hold out an olive branch to the diocese. But now that we've been excommunicated, we can go back to celebrating the Eucharist and operating the way we're used to." Callan believes that in a decade or two, the church will catch up with him. He said, "We're not star! ting our own denomination. We consider ourselves a Catholic church -- we're parallel. You know how they say pork is the other white meat? Well, we're the other Catholic church."
The last excommunication of a U.S. Roman Catholic priest cited by the Associated Press was that of Reverend George Stallings, Jr. of Washington and his African-American Catholic Congregation, which broke with the Vatican over women's ordination, birth control and abortion.
The Rochester diocese was hit February 24 with lawsuits by four of six Corpus Christi Church staff it fired in December, just a month after Callan had given them year-long contracts.