Tribunal declares priest who started his own church is heretic

Published: 2006-01-25

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. (CNS) -- A church tribunal of the San Bernardino Diocese has formally declared the Rev. Ned Reidy a heretic and schismatic, a diocesan spokesman told Catholic News Service Jan. 24. The former Holy Cross priest was pastor of a Palm Desert Catholic parish for 19 years before he left his order and the Catholic Church in 1999 and formed his own breakaway congregation. By leaving the church Rev. Reidy was automatically excommunicated. He remained a priest but was no longer in good standing. The judgment by the tribunal paves the way for Bishop Gerald R. Barnes of San Bernardino to laicize him, that is, to formally dismiss him from the clerical state, said Father Howard Lincoln, diocesan spokesman. In interviews with local media Rev. Reidy, 69, dismissed the church trial as medieval and said he is no longer under the authority of the Roman Catholic Church.

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