+Mar Markus I, The Second Patriarch of the Byzantine Catholic Church, died peacefully in his sleep on the afternoon of Saturday March 16, 2013. He was 85 years old. Thus begin a new era for the church, as our third patriarch +Mar Laurentius was elected and enthroned.
Born, Mark I. Miller, on 18 August 1927, in Missouri, he was the
descendant of Prussian immigrants to the United States, (the family name was von
Muller until 1924). Miller was orphaned shortly after birth as a result of the death
of both of his parents in a car crash, and was consequently adopted by Lena and
Oliver Skelton of Kansas, being raised with the name Oliver Wendell Skelton.
Aged 14, he converted from the Baptist faith to Roman Catholicism. He was
educated at Auburn Elementary in Auburn, Kansas and at Herington High School in Herington, Kansas and later at Saint John’s University.
In 1958 he entered the Independent Sacramental
Movement by becoming a member of The North American
Roman Catholic Church that developed after the death of Archbishop Henry Carmel Carfora. On August 25 1962 he married Phyllis Parsons, a nurse, and they raised three sons, one of whom was adopted. Discerned a call to the priesthood, and was ordained priest in 1963 by Archbishop Cyrus A. Starkey,
adopting at that time the religious name Leo Christopher Skelton, but soon thereafter returning legally to his birth name of Mark I. Miller.
The Byzantine Catholic Church emerged from the
work of Archbishop Robert Schuyler Zeiger through the American Orthodox Catholic
Church. In 1964, Zeiger consecrated Christopher Carl Jerome Stanley as +Mar
Christopher Maria. That same year, Stanley left the AOCC and formed his own
non-profit corporation, which he led until his death in 1967. On 10 January
1965, Stanley consecrated Miller a bishop with the assistance of Bishop Freewonsky, who carried the same apostolic lines of succession since he had also been consecrated by Stanley.
Miller left Stanley in 1966. Between then
and 1969, he was associated with the Orthodox Old Catholic Church under Archbishop
Guy Claude Hamel. Subsequently he formed the Orthodox Old Roman Catholic Church
II in Los Angeles, California, which became the North American Orthodox
Catholic Church in 1971. At that time he established an episcopal order, the Order of St
Basil, which followed the Benedictine Rule. In 1974 he formed the non-profit corporation that would serve his church for the remainder of his life.
In April 1975, Miller took the ecclesiastical title of +Mar
Markus I. as patriarch of his church. This marked a crucial transition for him from Old Roman Catholicism to
the Eastern Orthodoxy that was to characterize the remainder of his patriarchate. On August 3, 1976 he consecrated his priest, The Reverend Father Joel E. Dunaway, to the bishopric, assisted by Bishop David Mark Johnson. At the time of Miller's death, Dunaway was his senior cleric, having constantly remained with Miller's church for forty years. For Dunaway to remain with his consecrator for so long a time is something almost unheard of in the Independent Sacramental Movement churches. The movement's bishops tend to leave their consecrators church to found their own churches almost the moment they are consecrated. Today +Metropolitan Bishop Dunaway continues to serve the church Miller founded as the Apostolic Chancellor for the newly elected Patriarch +Mar Laurentius.
On
12 February 1981 Miller brought his church more strongly into line with Eastern
practice, prohibiting the entry of further married bishops and female clergy,
and changed its name to the World Independent Orthodox Catholic Church. In 1984,
this church merged with the Holy Orthodox Catholic Church, Eastern and
Apostolic, under Richard Bruce Morrill OSB (+Mar Apriam) to form the Byzantine
Catholic Church under Miller as Patriarch. At that time, he and Morrill exchanged sub-conditional consecrations picking up each others apostolic lines. However, Morrill later withdrew from the
union upon learning he had cancer, returned to his native Louisiana, and died a year later.
As antecedent, the
Byzantine Catholic Church looked directly to Stanley’s 1964 foundation, of which
Miller asserted that he was the successor as Stanley had bequeathed Miller his files and church, as well as the work of Richard Morrell's consecrator Walter Myron
Propheta (Patriarch Wolodymyr, 1912-1972) of the American Orthodox Catholic
Church. Propheta in turn traced his jurisdiction back to the 1927 foundation of
the Holy Eastern Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church in North America by
Archbishop Aftimios Ofiesh (1880-1966), which had been an attempt to establish
an indigenously American Orthodox church.
Miller’s written style was unmistakable;
trenchant and conversational, he was steadfast in his promulgation of Orthodox
doctrine and practice, and remained active and in good health into the last year
of his life. By the time of
his passing, he had become one of the elder statesmen of the independent
sacramental movement, having presided over a worldwide and growing communion
that continues today under his successor, +Mar Laurentius.
+Mar Laurentius (Lawrence Hicks) was consecrated on October 13, 1996 by Dunaway assisted by Miller. Dunaway brings several new sets of apostolic lines of succession into our church through his co-consecrator David Johnson. Lines that Miller himself always sought after, but never obtained. In the days before computers and the Internet, Miller and other independent bishops would exchange sub-conditional consecrations with each other hoping to ratify or strengthen their lineage back to the twelve apostles. Today, researching Millers attempts to gain direct Roman Catholic lines, shows us that the one man he came in contact with that had what he was hoping to receive, Bishop David Mark Johnson, gave this coveted succession to Dunaway, with Miller standing right next to him. It would have been so easy for Miller to have received them too, but Miller never asked to exchange lines with Johnson, as both men believed that both of their lines ultimately had the same roots in the Old Catholic Church. They were wrong!
David Mark Johnson carried lines through his co-consecrator straight back to the Episcopal Church USA founding bishops, and also to the Roman Catholic Church through their bishops in both Brazil and Mexico. In addition, other co-consecrators of Johnson gave him the lines of both the Russian and Syrian Orthodox lines straight back to their prime bishops and patriarch. Even more amazing is the lines all had clean straight paths with few bishops between Johnson and the golden threads of the four major apostolic denominations in his lines, all of which ultimately lead back to The Twelve Apostles.
So, the irony is that both Miller and Johnson were half right in their assumptions that Johnson's apostolic lines were similar to Millers... Through Johnson's primary consecrator's lines they were: "Old Catholic Union of Utrecht," as were Miller's through both his consecrator and co-consecrators. It was only Johnson's co-consecrator and their co-consecrators that was found the golden thread Miller so wanted.
To further explain just why all of the worry was taking place among the bishops, we have to look a little deeper into history. Again, we saw that in 1984 Richard Bruce Morrell did give Miller the Aftimios Ofisesh lines back to The Russian Orthodox Church. Remember, that is what lead Miller to drop the emphasis on Old Roman Catholicism in favor of Orthodoxy for the remainder of his life. Though Miller favored the western rite Catholic practices, he had decided that the Old Catholic Church lines in the United States were not valid due to their being attacked over the years by The Roman Catholic Press. More accurately, the issue was that bishops like Miller were more embarrassed by the Old Catholic lines being torn up in the press than they were worried about their actual validity. This embarrassment made Miller and many hundreds of other bishops go on wild sub-conditional re-consecration binges, hoping to grab the elusive golden succession thread.
To re-cap... Bishop David Mark Johnson had what everyone was looking for, but no one, not even Johnson himself, knew it at the time. Johnson was on the fringe of the Independent Sacramental Movement. He maintained a small chapel with a religious brother. Johnson did not mix much socially with his fellow bishops. To make things more difficult, Johnson dies at an early age due to cancer. Meanwhile, bishops like Itkin, Miller, and Shultz, traded lines with other bishops in a frenzy, but unknowingly, they all had the same lines, so it was just one big round-robin. We know this now that the Internet allows us to so easily see everyone's apostolic lines through: The Independent Sacramental Movement Database.
Since Dunaway and Hicks share identical apostolic lines of succession, they will strive to straighten out the Byzantine Catholic Church's errors that crept in under Miller's watch.
Look for new and exciting things to happen, and visit our pages often to learn about them in the coming days.
+Mar Laurentius (Lawrence Hicks) was consecrated on October 13, 1996 by Dunaway assisted by Miller. Dunaway brings several new sets of apostolic lines of succession into our church through his co-consecrator David Johnson. Lines that Miller himself always sought after, but never obtained. In the days before computers and the Internet, Miller and other independent bishops would exchange sub-conditional consecrations with each other hoping to ratify or strengthen their lineage back to the twelve apostles. Today, researching Millers attempts to gain direct Roman Catholic lines, shows us that the one man he came in contact with that had what he was hoping to receive, Bishop David Mark Johnson, gave this coveted succession to Dunaway, with Miller standing right next to him. It would have been so easy for Miller to have received them too, but Miller never asked to exchange lines with Johnson, as both men believed that both of their lines ultimately had the same roots in the Old Catholic Church. They were wrong!
David Mark Johnson carried lines through his co-consecrator straight back to the Episcopal Church USA founding bishops, and also to the Roman Catholic Church through their bishops in both Brazil and Mexico. In addition, other co-consecrators of Johnson gave him the lines of both the Russian and Syrian Orthodox lines straight back to their prime bishops and patriarch. Even more amazing is the lines all had clean straight paths with few bishops between Johnson and the golden threads of the four major apostolic denominations in his lines, all of which ultimately lead back to The Twelve Apostles.
So, the irony is that both Miller and Johnson were half right in their assumptions that Johnson's apostolic lines were similar to Millers... Through Johnson's primary consecrator's lines they were: "Old Catholic Union of Utrecht," as were Miller's through both his consecrator and co-consecrators. It was only Johnson's co-consecrator and their co-consecrators that was found the golden thread Miller so wanted.
To further explain just why all of the worry was taking place among the bishops, we have to look a little deeper into history. Again, we saw that in 1984 Richard Bruce Morrell did give Miller the Aftimios Ofisesh lines back to The Russian Orthodox Church. Remember, that is what lead Miller to drop the emphasis on Old Roman Catholicism in favor of Orthodoxy for the remainder of his life. Though Miller favored the western rite Catholic practices, he had decided that the Old Catholic Church lines in the United States were not valid due to their being attacked over the years by The Roman Catholic Press. More accurately, the issue was that bishops like Miller were more embarrassed by the Old Catholic lines being torn up in the press than they were worried about their actual validity. This embarrassment made Miller and many hundreds of other bishops go on wild sub-conditional re-consecration binges, hoping to grab the elusive golden succession thread.
To re-cap... Bishop David Mark Johnson had what everyone was looking for, but no one, not even Johnson himself, knew it at the time. Johnson was on the fringe of the Independent Sacramental Movement. He maintained a small chapel with a religious brother. Johnson did not mix much socially with his fellow bishops. To make things more difficult, Johnson dies at an early age due to cancer. Meanwhile, bishops like Itkin, Miller, and Shultz, traded lines with other bishops in a frenzy, but unknowingly, they all had the same lines, so it was just one big round-robin. We know this now that the Internet allows us to so easily see everyone's apostolic lines through: The Independent Sacramental Movement Database.
Since Dunaway and Hicks share identical apostolic lines of succession, they will strive to straighten out the Byzantine Catholic Church's errors that crept in under Miller's watch.
Look for new and exciting things to happen, and visit our pages often to learn about them in the coming days.
