Talk:Carmel Henry Carfora
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A short history
The Austrian Nobleman, who was raised to the Episcopate by Bishop Arnold Harris Mathew (pictured below and to the right) on June 29, 1913 was known to the world as Rudolph Francis Edward St. Patrick Alphonsus Ghislain de Gramont Hamilton de Lorraine-Brabant, Prince de Landas Berghes et de Rache, Duc de St. Winock. The British Foreign Office arranged for his departure from England in September of 1914 to prevent his being interned during the war as an "enemy alien." Such an act would have been highly embarrassing since the Prince was related to nearly every royal house in Europe.
He came to America and, as was common in those days for many Old Catholic clergymen in America, was licensed to function in the Episcopal Church. He assisted in the consecration of Hiram Richard Hulse as the Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Cuba on January 12, 1915 as is record in the Episcopal Church Annual (c.f. 1953 Annual.)
Bishop Rudolph de Landas Berghes took up residence at St. Dunstan's Abbey, Waukegan, Illinois and raised Abbot William H. F. Brothers to the episcopacy on October 3, 1916. The following day he consecrated Carmel Henry Carfora as a bishop of the Old Roman Catholic Church of America. He also with Bishop Carfora consecrated Stanislaus Mickiewicz, a former Polish National Catholic priest, in 1917.
Two years later Bishop de Landas Berghes resigned and retired to an Augustinian monastery in Villanova, Pennsylvania where he was reconciled to the Holy See and where he died on November 17, 1920.
Bishop Carfora had originally come from Italy as a Roman priest to work with the poor in America but found his work hampered by undue restrictions from his superiors and so left the Roman communion. He established several parishes in the United States and , being a volatile man, often embroiled himself in quarrels and squabbles concerning jurisdiction and church polity with his clergy. It seems that instead of taking the time and patience to work out difficulties, he would discover men with whom he thought he could work better and so would ordain or consecrate them bishops to supply clergy to his latest endeavors, often ignoring earlier efforts and the men he had ordained. Bishop Carfora was never averse to doing publicly that which tact would require be done privately and as a result the whole world would be a bemused spectator at what was essentially a "family affair." This gave rise to many speculations about his work and the Old Catholic Church here in the United States which no doubt contributed to many of the problems encountered by Old Catholicism in its efforts to establish itself in the new country.
One of his most fruitful associations was that formed with Francis Xavier Resch. Carfora consecrated Francis Resch as bishop on December 8, 1940 who eventually became the archbishop of the Old Catholic Church of America.
