Are you then "Episcopi Vagantes"?

Unfortunately we hear many clergy in the our sister Roman  parishes disparaging the Old Roman Catholic Church by stating that it is not a valid Church or they are “Episcopi Vagantes.”

​Nothing could be further from the truth and is an often misused phrase and purposely misapplied term regarding Old Roman Catholics. The term "Episcopi Vagantes" means Bishops invalidly consecrated, (literally in Latin "Wandering Bishops"). This term is quite often used to be derogatorily and more often by many of those who certainly ought to know better. The answer to the question then is an emphatic "no"!

So let us set the record straight here for once and for all.

An "Episopus vagans" is a man who was consecrated validly but irregularly or illicitly (unlawfully) i.e. without ecclesial approbation.  Approbation as defined is, in Catholic canon law, an act by which a bishop or other legitimate superior grants to an ecclesiastic the actual valid exercise of his ministry. Old Roman Catholics claim "valid canonicity" (licitness/lawfullness) because:

• The canonical dispute between the Holy See and the See of Utrecht was about whether the Ultrajectine (Latin for Utrecht) See could elect its own Bishops. There is no record that this remarkable privilage was never canonically (i.e. legally) concluded. It must be noted that Pope Pius IX in ignoring the due process required by Canon Law erected an uncanonical parallel heirarchy in Holland in 1853. In doing so his actions did not negate or remove the dispensations previously granted to the Archdioceses of Utrecht. Thus, it is only just, according to Canonical principles, to assume that the inalienable right granted by the Papal Bull of Blessed Eugene III allowing the Cathedral Chapter of Utrecht to elect their own bishops without permission or approval from the Pope is still extant and in effect. Later in 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council (Canons 23 and 24) again confirmed this privilege. Thus it is patiently clear by Roman Canon law that any individual consecrated as a bishop in the Old Roman Catholic Church is indisputably a valid Roman Catholic bishop.
  
  
• The rightful Archbishop of Utrecht (Archbishop Geraldus Gul) in 1909 consecrated Arnold Harris Mathew as a Bishop in accordance with all the norms of universal ecclesiastical law.
  
  
• When the See of Utrecht fell into 'apostasy' (i.e. departed from her rigid Catholic beliefs) in 1910, Bishop Mathew justifiably declared autonomy from the Ultrajectine See on December 29th 1910 and in doing so justifiably claimed her canonical rights and all prerogatives for the continuation and perpetuation of the Old Roman Catholic Church from the See of Utrecht. These same canonical rights and privileges were then passed on to all bishops he consecrated.

Thus the term "Episcopi Vagantes" cannot, by any means, justifiably be applied to the Old Roman Catholic Church, nor to any of her duly constituted and canonically governed ecclesial communities around the world, more especially in any way to her Bishops. The Old Roman Catholic Church is a recognized autocephalous and canonical ecclesial entity equal to any other so recognized Church of the East and has a legitimate claim to true and genuine canonical status within the Latin Rite which time and again been verified repeatedly by Rome herself.