Married Priests Now! is an advocacy group headed by Emmanuel Milingo

Emmanuel Milingo

Emmanuel Milingo is a former Roman Catholic archbishop from Zambia. In 1969, aged 39, Milingo was consecrated by Pope Paul VI as Bishop of the Archdiocese of Lusaka....

, a former Roman Catholic bishop from Zambia

Zambia

Zambia , officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. The neighbouring countries are the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Tanzania to the north-east, Malawi to the east, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia to the south, and Angola to the west....

. MPN is a liberal Catholic

Catholicism

Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....

 organization calling for relaxing the rules concerning marriage in the Latin Rite Catholic priesthood

Holy Orders

The term Holy Orders is used by many Christian churches to refer to ordination or to those individuals ordained for a special role or ministry....

. Milingo has said that "There is no more important healing than the reconciliation of 150,000 married priests with the 'Mother Church', and the healing of a Church in crisis through renewing marriage and family."

Automatic excommunication

Milingo gained international attention in September 2006 when he illicitly

Valid but illicit

Valid but illicit, also known as valid but illegal, as it pertains to Roman Catholicism, refers to the unauthorized but valid celebration of the sacraments, especially regarding the ordinations of clergy. In the Roman Catholic Church several kinds of people have authority to celebrate the sacraments...

 ordained four married men (George Augustus Stallings

George Augustus Stallings

George Augustus Stallings, Jr. is the founder of the Imani Temple African-American Catholic Congregation, an African-American-led form of Catholicism. He served as a Roman Catholic priest from 1974 to 1989...

 Jr. of Washington; Peter Paul Brennan

Peter Paul Brennan

Peter Paul Brennan is the bishop of the Ecumenical Catholic Diocese of the Americas , a bishop of the African Orthodox Church, the Primate of the Order of Corporate Reunion, and the current President of Married Priests Now!...

 of New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

; Patrick Trujillo of Newark

Newark, New Jersey

Newark is the largest city in the American state of New Jersey, and the seat of Essex County. As of the 2010 United States Census, Newark had a population of 277,140, maintaining its status as the largest municipality in New Jersey. It is the 68th largest city in the U.S...

, New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

; and Joseph Gouthro of Las Vegas

Las Vegas, Nevada

Las Vegas is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and is also the county seat of Clark County, Nevada. Las Vegas is an internationally renowned major resort city for gambling, shopping, and fine dining. The city bills itself as The Entertainment Capital of the World, and is famous...

, Nevada

Nevada

Nevada is a state in the western, mountain west, and southwestern regions of the United States. With an area of and a population of about 2.7 million, it is the 7th-largest and 35th-most populous state. Over two-thirds of Nevada's people live in the Las Vegas metropolitan area, which contains its...

)
as bishops. Milingo reportedly planned to hold a meeting in December 2006 of more than 1,000 married Catholic priests in New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

. Due to Milingo’s excommunication and his connection with non-Catholic religious leader Sun Myung Moon

Sun Myung Moon

Sun Myung Moon is the Korean founder and leader of the worldwide Unification Church. He is also the founder of many other organizations and projects...

, two groups of former Catholic priests who are pushing for a married priesthood, issued warnings against MPN.

According to Catholic canon law, the act of ordaining a bishop without the permission of the Pope incurs an automatic excommunication.

Policy of laicizations

Archbishop Paul Lebeaupin warned in 2009 that Catholic priests who had joined Married Priests Now! could be declared laymen by the Church, which would add a new penalty to Milingo's latae sententiae

Latae sententiae

Latæ sententiæ is a Latin term used in the canon law of the Catholic Church meaning literally "given sentence".Officially, a latae sententiae penalty follows automatically, by force of the law itself, when the law is contravened....

excommunication. On December 17, 2009, the Holy See announced that Milingo had been laicized

Defrocking

To defrock, unfrock, or laicize ministers or priests is to remove their rights to exercise the functions of the ordained ministry. This may be due to criminal convictions, disciplinary matters, or disagreements over doctrine or dogma...

, calling him "Mister Milingo".

External links

• Married Priests Now Website Italian website.
• Married Priests Now Website American website.