Clarence Kelly

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For the former director of the FBI, see Clarence M. Kelley.

Bishop Clarence Kelly, a Traditionalist Catholic bishop, was born in 1941. He was ordained a priest on April 13, 1973 at Ecône, Switzerland by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre for the Roman Catholic Society of St. Pius X.

Kelly eventually became Superior of the Society in the United States. In 1983 Kelly, along with eight other priests, were expelled from the Society because of their refusal to accept the 1962 Roman Missal promulgated by Pope John XXIII as directed by Archbishop Lefebvre as well as for their refusal to celebrate Masses Una cum Ioánne Paulo (II), a sign that the celebrant recognizes the latter as the legitimate Roman Pontiff. These expelled priests formed the de facto sedevacantist Society of St. Pius V (SSPV), which held, that it is, at least, a debatable question whether the popes since 1958 have in fact been legitimate Roman Pontiffs and, subsequently, whether the revisions of the Roman Missal after 1958 were legitimate.

Some of the original and principal priests of the SSPV, including Frs. Daniel Dolan, Donald Sanborn and Anthony Cekada, broke away from the SSPV in part due to Kelly's and others' rejection of the validity of bishops consecrated by or in the lineage of Roman Catholic archbishop Pierre Martin Ngo Dinh Thuc, and because they wanted to start an independent ministry more openly promoting the sedevacantist position. This happened after listening to much of the evidence for and against the episcopal consecrations by archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc, which included a trip to Germany to listen to the first hand witnesses of the consecrations conferred by archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc. Frs. Sanborn and Doland themselves have been subsequently consecrated bishops in this Thuc-lineage after previously openly rejecting them.

Fr. Clarence Kelly was consecrated a bishop on October 19, 1993 at Carlsbad, California, by Most. Rev. Alfredo Mendez Gonzalez (see [1]), the retired Bishop of Arecibo, Puerto Rico, a claim originally contested by Anthony Cekada and others who had broken away from Kelly and SSPV, but which they now concede.

Similar to the exclusivist policy of the elderly sedevacantist bishop Louis Vezelis O.F.M., bishop Clarence Kelly refuses to intercommunicate or permit intercommunion with some other Traditionalist Catholic groups, and forbids those who attend "schismatic" services from receiving Holy Communion in his chapels and churches. This is similar to the policy that Dolan and Sanborn previously held. This policy is founded on his rejection of the validity and schism of all orders derived from archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc's ordinations and consecrations. On January 7, 2007, it was announced that Bishop Kelly would consecrate Father Joseph Santay to the episcopate on February 28, 2007. Bishop Kelly ordained Father Santay to the priesthood on April 19, 2001.