Emmanuel Milingo


Emmanuel Milingo is a former Roman Catholic archbishop from Zambia. In 1969, aged 39, Milingo was consecrated by Pope Paul VI as the bishop of the Archdiocese of Lusaka. In 1983, he stepped down from his position as Archbishop of Lusaka after criticism for exorcism and faith healing practices unapproved by church authorities.
In 2001, when Milingo was 71, he received a from Sun Myung Moon, the leader of the Unification Church, despite the prohibition on marriage for ordained priests. In July 2006, he established Married Priests Now!, an advocacy organization to promote the acceptance of married priests in the Roman Catholic Church. On September 24, 2006, Milingo consecrated four men as bishops without a papal mandate. The Holy See Press Office announced two days later that Milingo had been automatically excommunicated by that act. On December 17, 2009, the Holy See Press Office announced that Milingo had been reduced to the lay state, making him no longer a member of the Catholic clergy. He retired from ministry in his movement for married priests in March 2013, appointing Peter Paul Brennan to take his place.

Life and career

Education and ordination

Born in 1930 in Mnukwa to Yakobe Milingo and Tomaida Lumbiwe, he was educated in St Mary's Presbyterial School in Chipata and attended the Kasina Seminary and Kachebere Seminary. He was ordained a priest in 1958. He was the parish priest in Chipata from 1963 to 1966 and founded the Zambia Helpers' Society during this time. He was the secretary of Mass Media at the Zambia Episcopal Conference from 1966 to 1969 and founded the Daughters of the Redeemer. Pope Paul VI consecrated him as bishop of the Archdiocese of Lusaka, the capital of Zambia. He served there from 1969 to 1983.
In the 1970s, Milingo conducted public religious services of healing and exorcism which attracted huge crowds. In 1999 and 2000 Milingo participated in mass-marriage ceremonies conducted by Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church in Japan and Korea, for which he received a severe written reprimand from Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Vatican Secretary of State.
In 1983 Pope John Paul II transferred Milingo to Rome for his inappropriate use of his office of exorcism and his role in causing divisions in the Lusaka Archdiocese. He was barred from practicing as a priest and bishop in Zambia, but the Pope appointed Milingo a "special delegate" of the Pontifical Council for Migrants and Travelers.
In 1992, Milingo endorsed the book On the Eucharist, a Divine Appeal, a collection of messages said to have been given by Jesus Christ in an apparition and written from September 8, 1987, to 1991 by Sr. Anna Ali, DOJS. These messages were a traditional call to conversion and eucharistic devotion, as well as expressing sadness over the current state of the Catholic priesthood. Although he did not hold office as a diocesan bishop at the time, his name appears on the book's purported imprimatur with the date March 17, 1992.
In the late 1990s, Milingo became well known in traditionalist and sedevacantist circles for a speech he gave at the Our Lady of Fatima 2000 International Conference on World Peace, organized by Canadian priest Nicholas Gruner and held November 18–23, 1996, in which he charged that high-ranking members of the church hierarchy were "followers of Satan" or otherwise enabled evil:

Marriage

In May 2001, Milingo said that the Roman Catholic Church should provide priests dispensation from the obligation of celibacy and should readmit married priests to the priestly ministry. To "set an example", at the age of 71, he and Maria Sung, a 43-year-old Korean acupuncturist, married in a blessing ceremony in New York City, presided over by Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han Moon. In July 2001, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, then prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, issued a Public Canonical Admonition officially warning Milingo to separate from Moon and from contacts with the Unification Church. Milingo protested the order, saying, "How can I now leave my wife? For 43 years as a celibate priest I only knew God as a male. Now, through my union with Maria, I have come to see the other side of God's heart, which is female."
In a press conference organized by the Unification Church affiliate American Church Leadership Conference, Milingo responded, "Celibacy has become a façade, secret affairs and marriages, raping of nuns, illegitimate children, rampant homosexuality, pedophilia and illicit sex have riddled the priesthood. Christ is mocked, the devil laughs." In August 2001, Milingo met with Pope John Paul II, who appealed to him: "In the name of Jesus Christ, return to the Catholic Church." Milingo agreed to separate from Sung and went into seclusion. Sung went on a hunger strike and appeared outside of St. Peter's Basilica to protest their separation.
In an interviews on Italian television in 2002, Milingo said that he had spent a year in prayer and meditation in Argentina, at a Capuchin monastery. In November 2003, he made a trip to Africa over the objections of the Catholic bishops there. In 2004 and 2005, he kept a low profile and media accounts suggested that he was living in a monastery near Rome.

Organization for married priests

In late June or early July 2006, Milingo surreptitiously left Italy and on July 12 announced at a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., his plans to "embark on an independent charismatic ministry to reconcile married priests with the Catholic Faith" as an advocate of the removal of the rule of celibacy for Latin Rite priests in the Catholic Church; the group is called Married Priests Now!. The sponsor of the press conference was MJT Television. Archbishop George Augustus Stallings, Jr., also an excommunicated priest, who had founded his own Imani Temple African-American Catholic Congregation, spoke as well.
Stallings stated that Milingo "is not seeking to defy or divide the Church, but is acting out of deep love for the Church and concern for its future." Milingo also announced that he wants to bring the Unification Church of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon closer to the Vatican. He announced he wanted them to cooperate in bringing religion to the world. In August 2006 Milingo rejoined his wife. In January 2010 it was reported that 20 priests in Uganda had formed a breakaway Catholic sect which accepts married priests. This was said to have been inspired by Milingo; the group claims to have around 12,000 members.

Excommunication

On September 24, 2006, Milingo consecrated four married men as bishops, each of whom were already ordained in the Old Catholic line of succession and serving as a bishop in their respective Independent Catholic churches. One of the four was Stallings. The other three were Archbishop Peter Paul Brennan of the Old Catholic Confederation; Archbishop Patrick E. Trujillo of the Old Catholic Church in America, and Archbishop Joseph J. Gouthro of Las Vegas, presiding bishop of the Catholic Apostolic Church International. Two days after the consecration of the four Americans as bishops, on September 26, 2006, the Holy See's press office announced in a statement that both Milingo and the four men involved in the episcopal consecration had automatically incurred excommunication in accordance with canon 1382 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law.
In October 2007, Milingo's Vatican passport was revoked, ending his status as a person with diplomatic protection from the Vatican City State.

Reduction to the lay state

In December 2007, in Brazil, Milingo conferred episcopal ordination on Harold J. Norwood. On July 15, 2009, in Massa, Italy, he consecrated Vitaliy Kuzhelnyi, a former priest of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, as a bishop.
On December 17, 2009, the Vatican Press Office in a statement announced that Milingo had been dismissed from the clerical state. The statement explained the effect of the action as "loss of the rights and duties attached to the clerical state, except for the obligation of celibacy; prohibition of the exercise of any ministry, except as provided for by Canon 976 of the Code of Canon Law in those cases involving danger of death; loss of all offices and functions and of all delegated power, as well as prohibition of the use of clerical attire. Consequently, the participation of the faithful in any future celebrations organized by Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo is to be considered unlawful."
On June 11, 2011, the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts issued a statement about illicitly consecrated bishops, pointing out the canons which provide for an automatic latae sententiae excommunication for both the consecrating bishop and those consecrated. Bishop Juan Ignacio Arrieta, Secretary of the Council, explained that the statement applied to the bishops consecrated by Milingo as well as to more recent cases.

Split with US married bishops

In 2009, four bishops consecrated by Milingo withdrew from his organization, distanced themselves from him due to "philosophical and theological differences", and announced the start of a separate organization to promote the ordination of married men.

Ecumenical Catholic Apostolic Church of Peace

In August 2010, Milingo was named Patriarch for Southern Africa of the new "Ecumenical Catholic Apostolic Church of Peace", and called for married former Catholic clergy to join the movement. In April 2011 he consecrated the Rev. Peter Njogu as a bishop in Nyeri, Kenya. In 2012, Milingo praised the late Sun Myung Moon for his work to promote religious unity. Milingo retired from ministry in 2013, appointing Archbishop Peter Paul Brennan as his successor. Later that year, he stated that he still considered himself a Roman Catholic.

Published works

Music albums:
Animated cartoon:
Books:
Milingo has written numerous books about healing and exorcism. They contain details about "the world in between" human beings and the divine, a world of evil and of good spiritual beings.