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Dr. David M. Drew 129 S. Beaver St.

York PA 17403

Dear Doctor Drew:

Bishop Nicholas C. Dattilo is in receipt of your letter of January 12. He has asked that I reply in his name.

Because of his office as a Bishop of the Catholic Church, it is not possible for Bishop Dattilo to participate in the manner you suggest in the dedication service of a church edifice for any group, denomination, or sect other than one in communion with the Roman Catholic Church.

In fulfillment of his ministry as successor of the Apostles, Bishop Dattilo continues to provide for the pastoral and liturgical care of members of the Catholic faithful throughout the fifteen county Diocese of Harrisburg, supporting Catholic parishes and schools in a growing and faith-filled local church. Your assumptions and assertions that the Catholic Church in Central Pennsylvania is declining are, in fact, erroneous and baseless, but your conclusions appear to be firmly established nonetheless.

In communion with his brother bishops and with the Bishop of Rome, Pope John Paul II, Bishop Dattilo has also applied the faculty granted exclusively to him as diocesan bishop to permit by extraordinary indult the celebration of the Catholic Mass using the 1962 Roman Missal. No other use of these solemn words and prayers can be considered a licit celebration of the Catholic Mass, It is correct that a Catholic Mass is valid and licit when celebrated by a priest who is a member of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, but such is not the case for your sect, and any ministrations conducted for your group cannot by any stretch of right reason be considered licit or proper for faithful Catholics in communion with the Roman Catholic Church. The priests whom you hire are not appointed by the diocesan bishop or any other successor of the Apostles, and utterly lack priestly faculties required for the validity of most sacraments, faculties which can be granted only by a bishop in communion with the Bishop of Rome. Indeed, the use of the phrase "Roman Catholic" in your group's title is forbidden by canon 300 of the Code Canon Law. Its continued use is a public misrepresentation.

If the words in your letter are true, and not falsehood, then in the same "holy Catholic obedience" you claim for yourself you will return

to what you know in your heart to be the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, walking away from an open act of schism. It is this to which your bishop invites you, in "holy Catholic obedience." If your sect's building were a true Catholic church edifice and your

members a true Catholic mission, you would have no need to invite the local bishop to the "consecration." Rather, it is he who would extend the invitation to you as a member of the Catholic faithful. The Catholic Church does not operate by congregationalism, nor is doctrine established by debate. Whether one is self-labeled as "traditional" or "progressive," the action of choosing or rejecting doctrine by personal reference is the same, and is to be decried. It is dissent from the authentic Magisterium.

Doctor Drew, neither I nor Bishop Dattilo hold you in personal contempt, despite the spiritual confusion, emotional tantrum, and scurrilous ad bominem attacks evinced by your correspondence. Rather, we hold you in prayer, that the light of the Holy Spirit may show you the peril in which your soul now stands and that you may return in faith and joy to the Catholic Church. -

Very truly yours,

(Very Rev.) William J. King, JCD Judicial Vicar

Secretary for Canonical Services

Office of Canonical Concerns * Office of Mediation Services * Office of the Chancellor * Office of Catholic History and Archives