Conciliar ‘Abbacy’ in California: Naturalism Masquerading as Monastic Life
The NCR portal (July 15, 2026) reports the election of Filipino-born Norbertine Father John Caronan as the third “abbot” of St. Michael’s Abbey in Silverado, California, succeeding the long-reigning “Abbot” Eugene Hayes. The ceremony, scheduled for September 28, will feature the imposition of pontifical insignia—ring, miter, crozier—by “prominent churchmen” and “civic officials.” The “abbot” selects the motto *Patris Corde*, echoing Bergoglio’s apostolic letter, and governs a “thriving” community of 68 “priests” and 32 seminarians operating parishes, a high school, a shrine, and a “digital apostolate.” This event is not a restoration of monastic order but the consolidation of a paramasonic counter-church structure, where canonical fiction replaces divine jurisdiction, and the *Lex Orandi* of the Novus Ordo—even in its “Tridentine” indult guise—serves the revolution.