North American Old Roman Catholic Church

Henry Alfonso Mary Carfora (a.k.a. Carmel Henry Carfora; August 27, 1878 - January 11, 1958), the son of Ferdinand Carfora and Angeline D'Ambrosio, was baptized a Roman Catholic in his native Naples, Italy on August 29, 1878 at two days of age.

He entered the Franciscans in 1894 and was ordained deacon by Bishop Giuseppe Ciglano on August 15, 1901 and priest by Bishop Francesco Vento of Aversa on December 21, 1901. He immigrated to America and served in New York. In 1906 he was called to the Diocese of Wheeling to minister to Italian immigrants. Eventually, in 1908, he left the Roman Catholic Church.

Carfora assumed leadership of a group of parishioners who broke away from St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church, in Youngstown, Ohio, to found St. Rocco's Independent National Catholic Church on May 17, 1907. He later formed mission congregations which ministered to various ethnic immigrant groups whom he perceived as unable to gain adequate pastoral support from the Roman Catholic authorities. In June, 1912 he incorporated his work as the National Catholic Diocese in North America, for a time under the episcopal oversight of Bishop Paolo Miraglia-Gulotti, leader of the Italian National Episcopal Church. 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 Carfora as a bishop of the North American Old Roman Catholic Church. St. Rocco's was disbanded until it was received into the Episcopal Church on June 15, 1918. In 1917 de Landas Berghes and Carfora united their jurisdictions, adopting the name "North American Old Roman Catholic Diocese" and established its headquarters in Chicago. When de Landas Berghes reconciled with the Roman Catholic Church in 1919, Carfora assumed the leadership of the group, which he renamed the "North American Old Roman Catholic Church".

Carfora's Church emphasized non-papal, pre-Vatican I Roman Catholic theology and practice, with the exception of permitting a married priesthood. The church grew over several decades under Carfora's leadership, ultimately reaching a peak membership reported as high as 50,000, consisting largely of ethnic parishes, each serving primarily first generation immigrants of a particular national origin. During his primacy, he consecrated at least thirty bishops to serve Polish, Lithuanian, Portuguese, Ukrainian, Mexican, and most successfully, West Indian populations in various parts of the United States where they were to be found in particular concentrations.

Carfora established several parishes in the United States and, being commited to the Apostilc authority conferred upon him, demanded that his clergy observe due respect concerning jurisdiction and church polity. Taking the time and patience to work out difficulties, he would discover men of traditional faith and practice 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. Carfora was not averse to exercising his apostolic authority with an iron hand, and this gave rise to many speculations about his work and the Old Catholic Church 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.

By the 1950s, several factors combined to threaten the continued viability of the church, including the assimilation of ethnic groups served by the church into the mainstream culture, a reduced interest among Americans in religion in general, and internal rivalries. For a time, plans were explored to merge with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, but Carfora ultimately abandoned the idea. In 1952, thirty parishes defied his decision and became Ukrainian Orthodox.

In 1953, Carfora entered a Roman Catholic hospital in Galveston, Texas, where he was pressured by Roman Catholic authorities to renounce his work. His episcopal ring was stolen and, suffering from heart disease and asthma, he went into a seclusion that amounted to retirement, retaining leadership of the church in title only. Several of his bishops took this opportunity to establish their own churches, often taking congregations with them. Others simply ceased to thrive.

According to his death certificate, Carfora died on January 18, 1958. The cause of his death was cancer of the pancreas. He was buried in the Irving Park Cemetery in Chicago on January 21, 1958 and was survived by his wife Stella. His grave stone was defaced many times and the stone was removed. It was replaced in 2015.The Society of Mercy.
"Blessing of the Grave and Mass."
Retrieved July 26, 2019.
Carfora was succeeded upon his death by HUBERT AUGUSTUS ROGERS Archbishop of New York; Third Metropolitan-Primate of the NAORCC (https://www.naorcc.org.) which is the original and Canonical Jurisdiction and whose Eighth Metropolitan-Primate today is THE MOST REVEREND EDWARD JAMES FORD, T.O.R., S.T.D

Later, men who had decieved Carfora by concealing their Theosophy, spiritism and homosexuality, split into three bodies, among which are the North American Old Roman Catholic Church Utrecht Succession, Archdiocese of California (Canonically Supressed, 2022 No longer Extant), the Archdiocese of the Old Catholic Church of America, and the Old Roman Catholic Church in North America.

Further reading

*Anson, Peter. ''Bishops at Large''. London: Faber and Faber, 1964.
*Carfora, Carmel Henry. "Historical and Doctrinal Sketch of the Old Roman Catholic Church". Chicago, IL: North American Old Roman Catholic Church, 1950.
*Melton, J. Gordon. ''Biographical Dictionary of American Cult and Sect Leaders''. Garland Reference Library of Social Science, vol. 212. New York: Garland Publishing, 1986.
*Karl Pruter, Pruter, Karl, and J. Gordon Melton. ''The Old Catholic Sourcebook''. New York: Garland Publishing Company, 1983.
*Trela, Jonathan. ''A History of the North American Old Roman Church''. Scranton, PA: The Author, 1979.

References

Sources

*"Carmel Henry Carfora", in ''Religious Leaders of America'', 2nd ed. Gale Group, 1999. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2006.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Carfora, Carmel Henry
1878 births
1958 deaths
American Old Catholic bishops
Presiding Archbishops of the North American Old Catholic Church
Italian emigrants to the United States
Former Roman Catholics
Italian Old Catholics
deaths from cancer in Illinois
deaths from pancreatic cancer
clergy from Naples