Vagant Bishop

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Vagantenbischöfe is a Germanization of the Latin term episcopi vagantes (Sg. Episcopus vagans ). Historically this means traveling bishops , i.e. bishops without a permanent bishopric . Today, vague bishops , especially colloquial and often derogatory, are clergymen who appear as ordained bishops after they have been ordained bishop in an irregular manner or after they have separated from the mother church, to which they owe the office of bishop.

Concept history

Originally episcopi vagantes simply referred to bishops without a bishopric. One reason for this could e.g. B. be that they were sent on a journey to do missionary work . Such a function can be found, for example, with the choir bishops in Carantania and Pannonia in the 8th and 9th centuries or with the missionaries of the Isle of Man. The name is also z. B. Commonly used by Irish missionaries of the 10th century with the title of bishop. Illegitimate episcopal ordination outside of large church structures is therefore only one of several reasons for the possible status of an episcopus vagans in the sense of the historical and technical use of the word.

criteria

Most of the time, the so-called vagante bishops represent small or very small groups. You work without commissioning or legal recognition by one of the large or larger Christian churches. Vagant bishops in particular do not belong to the Roman Catholic Church , the Utrecht Union of Old Catholic Churches or the Anglican Community as bishops. Vagant bishops can trigger a schism ( schism ).

Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church distinguishes the sacramental effectiveness and thus validity of episcopal ordination from its permissibility under canon law. The effectiveness depends on the right intention of the ordination giver and the observance of essential elements of the ordination rite . Furthermore, the consecrator must be in apostolic succession . Under these conditions there are effective and valid episcopal ordinations not only within, but also outside communion with the Pope , as in all Eastern Churches. In addition, the ordinations of certain persons can under certain circumstances be judged to be valid, but unauthorized and punishable. Clergymen, commonly referred to as vagabond bishops, are viewed as irregular, with at least many presumed that their ordination is ineffective until proven otherwise. Your treatment when accepted into full communion with the Pope will vary depending on the individual case.

In the early Middle Ages - in the missionary work of Germania and Scandinavia - mission bishops without a permanent diocese played a major role. These often acted on behalf of secular rulers or were provided with a letter from the Pope. They were supposed to establish new dioceses and through their work expand the sphere of influence of the Christian rulers. The best-known example is St. Boniface , who was ordained bishop in Rome by Pope Gregory II in 722 and who received the pallium in 732 .

Old Catholic Church

For the Old Catholic Church , in addition to and in deviation from the Roman Catholic position since Eduard Herzog (1915), the principle developed in the Mathew affair applies: nulla ecclesia sine episcopo, nullus episcopus sine ecclesia (no church without a bishop, no bishop without a church). While the first part of this maxim can be traced back to Irenaeus of Lyons and Tertullian , the second part was not previously formulated in this general way. The statement means that - contrary to the Roman Catholic view - "the lack of a lawful election or appointment can make a consecration invalid".

The International Bishops' Commission of the Union of Old Catholic Churches in Utrecht has discussed the following characteristics for a valid episcopal ordination outside the Roman Catholic Church: It regards every episcopal ordination as valid, the

  • by (at least) one validly ordained bishop
  • public
  • for an actually existing bishopric (diocese) or an actually existing parish
  • laying on of hands and calling down the Holy Spirit on those to be consecrated

is carried out.

If one of these points is questionable, one speaks of a "vagant bishop" or a "vagant bishop", depending on whether one wants to emphasize the invalidity or the validity of the ordination.

Orthodox Churches and Anglican Communion

In the Orthodox and Anglican Churches , as in the Roman Catholic Church, the old church principle applies that no congregation may be subordinate to two bishops at the same time (so-called overlapping jurisdiction).

Examples

The ordination lines of so-called vagante bishops that exist today can mostly be traced back to the following people as consecrators :

Spiritual sedevacant groups and churches can also be referred to as "vagantes".

In addition, there are theosophical communities which - with rights often contested by third parties - claim a line of consecration for their own bishops in apostolic succession .

literature

  • Carl Gerold Fürst : Episcopi Vagantes. in: Lexicon for Theology and Church , 3rd A., Vol. 3, pp. 725f.
  • Henry Renaud Turner Brandreth: Episcopi Vagantes and the Anglican Church. SPCK, 2nd A., London 1961.
  • Ivan Drouet de La Thibauderie d'Erlon: Eglises et évêques catholiques non romains. Paris 1962.
  • PF Anson: Bishops at Large. Faber & Faber, London 1964.
  • Edmund Plazinski: With crook and miter. The 'wandering bishops' and their communities . P. Meier, St. Augustin-Buisdorf 1970.
  • Friedrich Wilhelm Haack : God's 5th column. The Free Bishop's Churches in German-speaking countries . Augsburg 1976, ISBN 3-921513-05-7 .
  • W. Riediger: Becoming a bishop is not difficult ... "false" bishops living today. Augsburg 1976.
  • Friedrich Wilhelm Haack: The free bishop churches in the German-speaking area . Working group for religious and ideological issues, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-921513-50-2 .
  • Reinhard Schubert: Quis et unde? Critical auxiliary book for the study of the apostolic consecration of bishops in smaller churches and brotherhoods. 4 vols., Bremen 1983.
  • Karl Pruter: Bishops extraordinary. The Borgo Press, San Bernardino, Calif. 1986.
  • Friedrich Wilhelm Haack: Religion and Decoration. Free Bishops - Neoorden - Vagant Priests . Working group for questions of religion and ideology, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-921513-94-4 .
  • GL Ward / B. Persson / A. Bain: Independent Bishops : An International Directory, Detroit 1990
  • Karl Pruter: Autocephalous Orthodox Churches. A Directory of Autocephalous Bishops of the Churches of the Apostolic Succession. 6th edition, San Bernardino (Cal.) 1993 ff.
  • Godehard König: Episcopi vagantes . In: Hans Gasper (Hrsg.): Lexicon of sects, special groups and world views . 6th edition. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 2000, ISBN 3-451-05528-7 .
  • Joachim Müller: Episcopi vagantes . In: Hans Gasper u. a. (Ed.): Lexicon of new religious groups, scenes and world views . 1st edition. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 2005, ISBN 3-451-28256-9 .

Web links

Wiktionary: Vagantenbischof  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations
  • Joachim Müller: Wandering Bishops , Catholic Laboratory “New Religious Movements in Switzerland”.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ CG Fürst, lc, 725, defines for example: “One could describe those persons as E [piscopi vagantes] who, although they have the title of bishop, refer to successio apostolica and in many cases also the episcopal insignia wear which in the major Christian churches correspond to the [episcopal] rank, but outside of the major churches or were not consecrated at all. "
  2. ↑ Joseph George Cumming: Antiquitates Manniae . Vol. 1, Manx Society, Douglas 1868, pp. 75f, online .
  3. ↑ See also z. B. the overview in the article Bishop, V.1. in: William Smith (Ed.): A Dictionary of Christian Antiquities . 2 vols., London 1876-80, reprinted as Encyclopaedic Dictionary Of Christian Antiquities . 9 vols., Logos, New Delhi 2005, vol. 1, p. 240, online .
  4. ↑ Article Episcopi vagantes in: Johannes P. Schadé: Encyclopedia of World Religions . Foreign Media Group 2006, p. 309, online .
  5. ↑ For individual references to individual cases, see the comments below on the individuals as well as the reference works cited such as Schubert 1983. For the criteria for a legitimate bishop's election cf. including CIC 1983 Can. 351, 377, 1013 ( online ).
  6. ↑ In this context, Urs Küry, for example, recurs : The Old Catholic Church. Their history, their teaching, their concerns . Edited by Christian Oeyen, 3. A. Ev. Verlagswerk, Frankfurt am Main 1982, p. 97 on Herzog 1915.
  7. ↑ E. Herzog: Two theses about the validity of an episcopal consecration . In: International Church Journal . Vol. 5, No. 3 . Stämpfli, 1915, ISSN  0020-9252 , p. 271-296 . , Online
  8. ↑ Herzog 1915, p. 289
  9. ↑ First Council of Constantinople , Canon 2 (Τοὺς ὑπὲρ διοίκησιν ἐπισκόπους ταῖς ὑπερορίοις ἐκκλησίαις μὴ ἐπ ·ληναι, μηδὲ συκγχές ἐνσινσινσιν συκγχές. For the Anglican churches, see also Resolution 27 of the Lambeth Conference 1920 ( archived copy ( memento of 14 July 2010 in the Internet Archive )) and resolution 54 of 1958 ( archived copy ( memento of 16 May 2007 in the Internet Archive )).
  10. ↑ Cf. Decreto con il quale si dichiarano le pene canoniche incorse dall'Arcivescovo Pierre-Martin Ngô-dińh-Thuc e complici per le ordinazioni individuellecite di presbiteri e vescovi in ​​località “El Palmar de Troya” / Decretum circa quasinationdam presbyterales et episcopales, September 17, 1976 in: AAS 68 : 623 (1976); Notificazione con la quale si dichiarano di nuovo le pene canoniche incorse dall'Arcivescovo Pierre-Martin Ngô-dińh-Thuc e complici per le ordinazioni individuellecite di presbiteri e vescovi / Notificatio qua poenae canonicae Episcopis quiunti denopuoe ordiosque hocinimo episcopis quiunti denopuo comminantur, March 12, 1983, in: AAS 75 (1983) 392-393.