The Prince-Abbot has been honoured by the Royal Order of St Stanislaus in Poland. The Order continues the chivalric work established by the Most Revd. Prince Juliusz Nowina-Sokolnicki, formerly its Grand Master. Prince Juliusz was a bishop of the Apostolic Episcopal Church in which the Prince-Abbot also serves.

The Order has conferred upon the Prince-Abbot one of its highest awards, the Gold Cross of Merit.

In addition, the Prince-Abbot has received the Medal of the Commandery of Wrocław of the Order.

The Prince-Abbot has been honoured with the President’s Lifetime Achievement Award, issued by President Barack Obama “for lifelong commitment to building a stronger nation through volunteer service.” The Prince-Abbot, who is an Honorary Texan as well as having received honours from the Governors of Kentucky, Nebraska and Georgia, was delighted to receive this honour, which came as a complete surprise to him, and has expressed the hope that it may serve to encourage other Americans to donate their time and effort to worthwhile causes.

The Archive of the Abbey-Principality has recently received the ceremonial cope of Archbishop Forest Ernest Barber. This was made for him in tropical weight satin for use during his annual visits to the Philippines, where he was head of the Holy Apostolic Church of the Philippines (part of the Igreja Catolica Brasileira) and served as Bishop of Hugao in the Philippine Independent Church (part of the Anglican Communion).

Cathedral Church of Our Lady of Good Death, Colombo – photograph credit MARP/OCP (click the image to go to their website)

The Mar Alvares Research Project (MARP) with Orthodoxy Cognate Page (OCP) has published photographs of the Cathedral of our Patron Mar Julius I Alvares in Colombo, Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka). Their article can be read in full at this link: http://theorthodoxchurch.info/blog/news/2014/12/the-historic-cathedral-of-metropolitan-alvares-julius-in-colombo-rediscovered-by-ocp-marp-initiative

The Cathedral of Our Lady of Good Death (Boa Morte) was the headquarters of the Independent Catholic Church of Ceylon, Goa and India (excluding Malabar) under the Indian Orthodox Malankara Church, led by Mar Julius I Alvares as Metropolitan after his consecration and appointment in 1889. Here, in 1892, Archbishop Joseph René Vilatte (Mar Timotheos) (who would in 1899 become Prince-Abbot Joseph III of San Luigi), was consecrated bishop by Mar Julius I Alvares and appointed as the first Metropolitan of the Old Catholics in the United States. The consecrating bishops and other dignitaries present at the ceremony were honoured with membership in the Order of the Crown of Thorns.

The continuous ministry of the Independent Catholic Church at the Cathedral can be traced until at least 1949. Today, ministry at the Cathedral continues under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Abbey-Principality of San Luigi wishes all visitors to our website a safe and blessed Christmass.

^“For a CHILD IS BORN to us, and a son is given to us, and the government is upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called, Wonderful, Counsellor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace.

His empire shall be multiplied, and there shall be no end of peace: he shall sit upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom; to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth and for ever: the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.” – Isaiah 9:6-7

The tabernacle of Prince-Abbot Edmond I, hand-crafted and used in his private oratory, is now a part of the Archive of the Abbey-Principality once more. The tabernacle has been sympathetically restored by its previous custodians at the archive of the American Chapter of the Order of the Crown of Thorns, and is now in use in the oratory of the Prince-Abbot. It is decorated with an ikon of the Theotokos.

The Archive of the Abbey-Principality includes a gold bullion preaching stole of Prince-Abbot Joseph III. Three of these, all made in France during the nineteenth-century, were owned by him: the example in our Archive, a further example in the archive of the American Chapter, and one more which is now in private hands.

The preaching stole, with its characteristic “spade”-shaped ends, is made in cloth of gold decorated with elaborate embroidery in heavy gold bullion.