By Phil Lawler, Catholic Culture, Aug 24, 2020
Phil Lawler has been a Catholic journalist for more than 30 years. He has edited several Catholic magazines and written eight books. Founder of Catholic World News, he is the news director and lead analyst at CatholicCulture.org. See full bio.
A priest learns that he was not validly baptized. And since he was not validly baptized, his ordination was also invalid. And since he was not validly ordained, when he celebrated Mass or heard confessions, those sacraments weren’t valid, either. The Archdiocese of Detroit has a mess on its hands.
For Father Matthew Hood, who realized that he had been “baptized” with a formula that the Vatican recently declared invalid, the problem has already been corrected. He has been quickly baptized and ordained— validly, this time around— and going forward, his priestly ministry is on solid ground. But what about the past three years in ministry, when he and his parishioners innocently thought he was a Catholic priest, but he wasn’t? …