Toronto, Canada - A Canadian priest, who fell afoul of the Catholic church after he backed the ordination of female clergy, was formally excommunicated on Palm Sunday after he held services in his own breakaway church.
The service was the second held by Reverend Ed Cachia under his new Christ the Servant Catholic Church and was attended by about 250 people at a town hall in Cold Springs, a village about 130 km (80 miles) northeast of Toronto.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Peterborough promptly declared a "schismatic church" and said Cachia had "incurred automatic excommunication by virtue of the law of the Church."
"The Christian faithful should not frequent this breakaway church, nor support the disobedience of Fr. Cachia," Peterborough Bishop Nicola De Angelis said in a letter read out in churches in the diocese.
"The bishop had to respond lest there be more confusion on the part of the people," Reverend Tom Lynch, spokesman for the diocese said on Monday.
The rift stems from Cachia's support for nine women ordained on a boat on the St. Lawrence River last July in defiance of the Church, which says women cannot be priests.
Cachia could not be reached for comment on Monday. He told a Canadian newspaper he felt sadness after learning he had been excommunicated. "I never in my whole lifetime ever dreamt it would come to this," he said.
Many parishioners have followed him to the breakaway church.
"The reason we left was out of protest over the way the bishop is handling this and how he is attempting to crush Father Ed over such a simplistic thing," parishioner Mark King said by telephone.
Lynch said the presence of a so-called "schismatic community" in Canada is rare and this may be the first time a community here has taken such a step.