The Detroit man thought he was a priest. He wasn't even a baptized Catholic

If you think you are a priest, and you really are not, you have a problem. So do many other people. The baptisms you have performed are valid baptisms. But the confirmations? No. The masses you celebrated were not valid. Neither acquittals or anointings. What about weddings? Well… it's complicated. Some yes, some no. It depends on the paperwork, believe it or not.

Father Matthew Hood of the Archdiocese of Detroit learned all this the hard way.

He thought he was ordained a priest in 2017. Since then he had carried out the priestly ministry.

And then this summer, he learned he wasn't a priest at all. In fact, he learned that he wasn't even baptized.

If you want to become a priest, you must first become a deacon. If you want to become a deacon, you must first be baptized. If you are not baptized, you cannot become a deacon and you cannot become a priest.

Certainly, Fr. Hood thought he was baptized as a child. But this month he read a notice published recently by the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The note said that changing the words of baptism in a certain way renders it invalid. That if the person who baptizes says: "We baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit", instead of "I baptize you ..." the baptism is not valid.

He remembered a video he had seen of his baptism ceremony. And he remembered what the deacon had said: "We baptize you ..."

His baptism was invalid.

The Church assumes that a sacrament is valid unless there is some evidence to the contrary. It would have been assumed that Fr. Hood was validly baptized, except that he had a video showing the opposite.

Father Hood called his archdiocese. It needed to be sorted. But first, after three years of acting like a priest, living like a priest and feeling like a priest, he needed to become a Catholic. He needed to be baptized.

In a short time he was baptized, confirmed and received the Eucharist. He made a retreat. He was ordained a deacon. And on August 17, Matthew Hood finally became a priest. Really.

The archdiocese of Detroit announced this unusual circumstance in a letter released on August 22.

The letter explained that after realizing what had happened, Fr. Hood “was recently validly baptized. Moreover, since other sacraments cannot be validly received in the soul without a valid baptism, also Father Hood was recently validly confirmed and validly ordained a transitional deacon and then a priest “.

"We give thanks and praise to God for blessing us with Father Hood's ministry."

The archdiocese released a guide, explaining that the people whose marriages were celebrated by Fr. Hood should contact their parish and that the archdiocese was making its own efforts to contact those people.

The archdiocese also said it is making an effort to contact other people whose baptism was performed by deacon Mark Springer, the deacon who invalidly baptized Hood. He is believed to have baptized others invalidly during 14 years in the parish of St. Anastasia in Troy, Michigan, using the same invalid formula, a deviation from the rite that clerics must use when performing baptisms.

The guide clarified that while the acquittals carried out by Fr. Hood prior to his valid ordination were not in themselves valid, "we can be sure that all who approached Father Hood, in good faith, to make a confession did not leave without some measure of grace and forgiveness from part of God ".

“That said, if you remember serious (fatal) sins that you would have confessed to Father Hood before he was validly ordained and have not yet been to a later confession, you must take them to your next confession by explaining to any priest what happened. If you cannot remember if you have confessed serious sins, you should carry this fact to your next confession as well. A subsequent absolution will include those sins and give you peace of mind, ”the guide said.

The archdiocese also answered a question that many Catholics expect to ask: “Isn't it legalistic to say that even though there was an intention to confer a sacrament, there was no sacrament because different words were used? Won't God take care of this? "

"Theology is a science that studies what God has told us and, when it comes to sacraments, there must not only be the right intention of the minister, but also the right 'matter' (material) and the right 'form' (words / gestures - such as a triple pour or immersion of water by the speaker). If one of these elements is missing, the sacrament is invalid, ”the archdiocese explained.

"As far as God 'cares for him,' we can trust that God will help those whose hearts are open to Him. However, we can have a much greater degree of confidence by strengthening ourselves with the sacraments He has entrusted to us."

"According to the ordinary plan that God has established, the Sacraments are necessary for salvation: baptism leads to adoption in the family of God and places sanctifying grace in the soul, since we are not born with it and the soul needs to have grace sanctifying when he moves away from his body to spend eternity in paradise ”, added the archdiocese.

The archdiocese said it first learned that Deacon Springer was using an unauthorized formula for baptism in 1999. The deacon was instructed to stop deviating from liturgical texts at the time. The archdiocese said that, although wrongdoing, it had believed that the baptisms Springer had performed were valid until the Vatican's clarification was released this summer.

The deacon is now retired "and is no longer active in the ministry," the archdiocese added.

No other Detroit priests are believed to be invalidly baptized, the archdiocese said.

And p. Hood, just baptized and just ordained? After an ordeal that began with the liturgical "innovation" of a deacon, Fr. Hood now serves in a parish named after a holy deacon. He is the new associate pastor of St. Lawrence Parish in Utica, Michigan.