EWTN News portal reports that the Diocese of Lansing, Michigan, recently ordained four new “priests” at St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in East Lansing, after the crowd reportedly exceeded the capacity of St. Mary’s Cathedral. Bishop Earl Boyea, a man who will soon reach the mandatory retirement age of 75, presided over the ceremony, urging the ordinands to “drink the cup which the Lord gives.” The event was marked by emotional testimonies, the use of antique chalices, and a focus on personal journeys and psychological healing. However, beneath the veneer of pomp and pious sentimentality lies a profound spiritual void—a stark illustration of the conciliar sect’s reduction of the Catholic priesthood to a mere functionary role within a naturalistic, therapeutic institution.
The Eclipse of the Sacrifice: A “Mass” Without the Cross
The most glaring omission in the report—and indeed in the entire conciliar paradigm—is the near-total absence of the theology of the propitiatory sacrifice. The priesthood, in the integral Catholic understanding, is instituted primarily for the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, an unbloody re-presentation of Calvary. Yet, the language used by the new “priests” and their “bishop” is saturated with the horizontal, naturalistic spirit of the age.
Ryan Ferrigan, one of the ordinands, spoke of his priesthood being “all about the glory of God and the salvation of souls,” yet his subsequent words reveal a therapeutic, almost corporate mindset: “I’m excited about learning to be a parish priest and diving into ministry. This is how the Lord wants me to feed his sheep.” While “feeding sheep” is a scriptural metaphor, in the modernist context, it is stripped of its supernatural context of sanctifying grace and reduced to social work and community management.
The chalice, a sacred vessel meant to contain the Blood of the Lamb, is treated as a historical artifact or a psychological talisman rather than an instrument of the Holy Sacrifice. Ferrigan’s focus on an antique chalice from a shuttered parish—”In reparation from a friend of the Sacred Heart”—highlights a nostalgic attachment to the material objects of worship while the substance of that worship has been gutted. The vessel is revered, but the theology of what it contains and what is done with it has been lost to the “spirit of Vatican II.”
The Therapeutic Priesthood: Grief, Trauma, and Self-Fulfillment
The conciliar sect has effectively replaced the altar of sacrifice with the couch of the therapist. This is nowhere more evident than in the testimony of Peter Randolph, whose ordination was framed not by the majesty of God or the terror of the Holy Office of the Priest, but by the recent death of his brother.
Randolph’s vow to “accept this chalice” and “drink it to the dregs” is emotionally manipulative but theologically bankrupt. He quotes Matthew 26:42 (“Father, if this cup cannot pass…”), yet he applies it to his own grief and “broken humanity.” This is the height of anthropocentrism: the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the priestly character are made subservient to the emotional needs of the individual.
In the true Catholic tradition, the priest offers the Mass *in reparation* for sins and for the souls in Purgatory, acting as a mediator between God and man. In the neo-church, the priest is a “wounded healer” whose primary qualification is his shared experience of human trauma. The focus has shifted from the vertical (God-man) to the horizontal (man-man), effectively denying the supernatural character of the priesthood.
The Invalidity of Intention: The Bugnini Rite and Its Fruits
It is a matter of grave theological concern that these ordinations took place within the framework of the conciliar sect, which has systematically dismantled the Roman Rite. While the article does not specify the exact rite used, the context of the Diocese of Lansing—a standard “Latin-rite” diocese under the authority of the antipope—strongly suggests the use of the 1968 Ordo Ordinationum or a subsequent revision.
The Catholic Church has always taught that the rites of the Church are not mere external forms but the outward expression of interior faith. When the rites are changed to reflect a false theology—as was the case with the Bugnini reform—the very validity and liceity of the sacraments are thrown into question. If the rite is defective in its intention or form, the “priesthood” conferred is a mere simulation, incapable of conferring the sanctifying grace necessary for the offering of the Holy Sacrifice.
St. Pius X, in his encyclical *Lamentabili sane exitu*, condemned the modernist proposition that the sacraments merely “remind man of the presence of the ever-benevolent Creator” (Proposition 41). Yet, this is precisely the functional theology of the conciliar sect. The “Mass” is a memorial meal, and the “priest” is a president of the assembly. If these men are ordained to a functional, naturalistic priesthood, they are not priests of the Catholic Church in the theological sense, regardless of the apostolic succession of the hands that laid upon them.
The “Drinking of the Cup”: A Perversion of Asceticism
Bishop Boyea’s exhortation to “drink the cup which the Lord gives” is a classic example of modernist ambiguity. In the mouth of a saint like St. Paul or St. John of the Cross, this refers to the acceptance of suffering, persecution, and the mystical union with Christ’s Passion. In the context of the article, it is coupled with the therapeutic language of “drinking it to the dregs” in the context of personal grief.
The cross is no longer the instrument of salvation and the model of Christian life; it is a psychological burden to be “accepted” in a journey of self-actualization. The true priest drinks the cup of the Lord by offering Himself as a victim with Christ for the salvation of souls. The modernist “priest” drinks the cup of his own experiences, seeking only to “feed his sheep” with a message of vague, non-judgmental love.
Conclusion: The Abomination of Desolation in Lansing
The ordinations in Lansing are a microcosm of the post-conciliar apostasy. We see a “Church” that is growing in numbers (the largest class in 50 years) but is spiritually sterile. It produces “priests” who are emotionally sensitive, socially active, and liturgically innovative, but who lack the fundamental mark of the Catholic priesthood: the intention to offer the propitiatory sacrifice of the Mass for the living and the dead.
The conciliar sect continues to ordain men to a priesthood that Christ did not institute, using rites that the Church has not sanctioned, for a “salvation” that requires no supernatural faith or repentance. As the true Church endures in the catacombs of fidelity, the structures occupying the Vatican and its daughter dioceses like Lansing continue to celebrate the rites of a religion that is not Catholic. Let us pray for these four men, that they may yet discover the terrible beauty of the true priesthood and the Holy Sacrifice, before the “cup” they have accepted becomes the cup of God’s wrath.
[Antichurch] Neo-Church Ordinations: Empty Rituals in a Vacuum of Faith
EWTN News portal reports that the Diocese of Lansing, Michigan, recently ordained four new “priests” at St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in East Lansing, after the crowd reportedly exceeded the capacity of St. Mary’s Cathedral. Bishop Earl Boyea, a man who will soon reach the mandatory retirement age of 75, presided over the ceremony, urging the ordinands to “drink the cup which the Lord gives.” The event was marked by emotional testimonies, the use of antique chalices, and a focus on personal journeys and psychological healing. However, beneath the veneer of pomp and pious sentimentality lies a profound spiritual void—a stark illustration of the conciliar sect’s reduction of the Catholic priesthood to a mere functionary role within a naturalistic, therapeutic institution.
The Eclipse of the Sacrifice: A “Mass” Without the Cross
The most glaring omission in the report—and indeed in the entire conciliar paradigm—is the near-total absence of the theology of the propitiatory sacrifice. The priesthood, in the integral Catholic understanding, is instituted primarily for the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, an unbloody re-presentation of Calvary. Yet, the language used by the new “priests” and their “bishop” is saturated with the horizontal, naturalistic spirit of the age.
Ryan Ferrigan, one of the ordinands, spoke of his priesthood being “all about the glory of God and the salvation of souls,” yet his subsequent words reveal a therapeutic, almost corporate mindset: “I’m excited about learning to be a parish priest and diving into ministry. This is how the Lord wants me to feed his sheep.” While “feeding sheep” is a scriptural metaphor, in the modernist context, it is stripped of its supernatural context of sanctifying grace and reduced to social work and community management.
The chalice, a sacred vessel meant to contain the Blood of the Lamb, is treated as a historical artifact or a psychological talisman rather than an instrument of the Holy Sacrifice. Ferrigan’s focus on an antique chalice from a shuttered parish—”In reparation from a friend of the Sacred Heart”—highlights a nostalgic attachment to the material objects of worship while the substance of that worship has been gutted. The vessel is revered, but the theology of what it contains and what is done with it has been lost to the “spirit of Vatican II.”
The Therapeutic Priesthood: Grief, Trauma, and Self-Fulfillment
The conciliar sect has effectively replaced the altar of sacrifice with the couch of the therapist. This is nowhere more evident than in the testimony of Peter Randolph, whose ordination was framed not by the majesty of God or the terror of the Holy Office of the Priest, but by the recent death of his brother.
Randolph’s vow to “accept this chalice” and “drink it to the dregs” is emotionally manipulative but theologically bankrupt. He quotes Matthew 26:42 (“Father, if this cup cannot pass…”), yet he applies it to his own grief and “broken humanity.” This is the height of anthropocentrism: the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the priestly character are made subservient to the emotional needs of the individual.
In the true Catholic tradition, the priest offers the Mass *in reparation* for sins and for the souls in Purgatory, acting as a mediator between God and man. In the neo-church, the priest is a “wounded healer” whose primary qualification is his shared experience of human trauma. The focus has shifted from the vertical (God-man) to the horizontal (man-man), effectively denying the supernatural character of the priesthood.
The Invalidity of Intention: The Bugnini Rite and Its Fruits
It is a matter of grave theological concern that these ordinations took place within the framework of the conciliar sect, which has systematically dismantled the Roman Rite. While the article does not specify the exact rite used, the context of the Diocese of Lansing—a standard “Latin-rite” diocese under the authority of the antipope—strongly suggests the use of the 1968 Ordo Ordinationum or a subsequent revision.
The Catholic Church has always taught that the rites of the Church are not mere external forms but the outward expression of interior faith. When the rites are changed to reflect a false theology—as was the case with the Bugnini reform—the very validity and liceity of the sacraments are thrown into question. If the rite is defective in its intention or form, the “priesthood” conferred is a mere simulation, incapable of conferring the sanctifying grace necessary for the offering of the Holy Sacrifice.
St. Pius X, in his encyclical *Lamentabili sane exitu*, condemned the modernist proposition that the sacraments merely “remind man of the presence of the ever-benevolent Creator” (Proposition 41). Yet, this is precisely the functional theology of the conciliar sect. The “Mass” is a memorial meal, and the “priest” is a president of the assembly. If these men are ordained to a functional, naturalistic priesthood, they are not priests of the Catholic Church in the theological sense, regardless of the apostolic succession of the hands that laid upon them.
The “Drinking of the Cup”: A Perversion of Asceticism
Bishop Boyea’s exhortation to “drink the cup which the Lord gives” is a classic example of modernist ambiguity. In the mouth of a saint like St. Paul or St. John of the Cross, this refers to the acceptance of suffering, persecution, and the mystical union with Christ’s Passion. In the context of the article, it is coupled with the therapeutic language of “drinking it to the dregs” in the context of personal grief.
The cross is no longer the instrument of salvation and the model of Christian life; it is a psychological burden to be “accepted” in a journey of self-actualization. The true priest drinks the cup of the Lord by offering Himself as a victim with Christ for the salvation of souls. The modernist “priest” drinks the cup of his own experiences, seeking only to “feed his sheep” with a message of vague, non-judgmental love.
Conclusion: The Abomination of Desolation in Lansing
The ordinations in Lansing are a microcosm of the post-conciliar apostasy. We see a “Church” that is growing in numbers (the largest class in 50 years) but is spiritually sterile. It produces “priests” who are emotionally sensitive, socially active, and liturgically innovative, but who lack the fundamental mark of the Catholic priesthood: the intention to offer the propitiatory sacrifice of the Mass for the living and the dead.
The conciliar sect continues to ordain men to a priesthood that Christ did not institute, using rites that the Church has not sanctioned, for a “salvation” that requires no supernatural faith or repentance. As the true Church endures in the catacombs of fidelity, the structures occupying the Vatican and its daughter dioceses like Lansing continue to celebrate the rites of a religion that is not Catholic. Let us pray for these four men, that they may yet discover the terrible beauty of the true priesthood and the Holy Sacrifice, before the “cup” they have accepted becomes the cup of God’s wrath.
Source:
Michigan diocese celebrates new priests after ordinations moved out of cathedral (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 14.06.2026