The Most Reverend George Augustus Stallings Jr. | |
|---|---|
| Archbishop of theAfrican-American Catholic Congregation | |
 Stallings in 1993 | |
| Church | African-American Catholic Congregation |
| In office | 1990–present |
| Previous post | Priest of theRoman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington |
| Orders | |
| Ordination | July 20, 1974 |
| Consecration | May 12, 1990 by Richard Bridges |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1948-03-17)March 17, 1948 (age 77) |
| Denomination | Independent Catholicism |
| Education | |
George Augustus Stallings Jr. (born March 17, 1948) is an American religious leader. He was the founder of theImani Temple African-American Catholic Congregation and was long active in theBlack Catholic movement. He served as aCatholic priest from 1974 to 1989, and was based inWashington, D.C., for many years. He established the Imani Temple as an independent denomination in 1989, making a public break in 1990 with theRoman Catholic Church onThe Phil Donahue Show. TheArchbishop of Washingtonexcommunicated him that year.
Stallings was born in 1948 inNew Bern, North Carolina, to George Augustus Stallings Sr., and Dorothy Smith. His grandmother—Bessie Taylor—introduced him as a boy to worship in a black Baptist church. He enjoyed the service so much that he said he wanted to be a minister. During his high school years, he began expressing "Afrocentric" sentiments, insisting on his right to wear a mustache, despite school rules, as a reflection of black identity.[1]
To prepare for the priesthood, he attended St. Pius X Seminary in Kentucky and received aBA degree in philosophy in 1970. Sent by his bishop to thePontifical North American College in Rome, he earned three degrees from thePontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas between 1970 and 1975: theBachelor of Sacred Theology (S.T.B.), a master's degree in pastoral theology, and aLicentiate of Sacred Theology (S.T.L.).[citation needed]
Stallings was ordained a priest in 1974. His first assignment was as an associate pastor at Our Lady of Peace Church, Washington, D.C. In 1976, at age 28 and two years after ordination, he was named a pastor of St. Teresa of Avila parish in Washington.[2] He was the pastor of this church for 14 years. During Stallings' pastorate, the parish become known for its integration ofAfrican American culture and gospel music in the Mass. He was active in theBlack Catholic movement and promoted the integration of African American culture into Roman Catholicism.[3]
In 1985, Stallings secretly bought a private home in Anacostia in violation of the archdiocese rule requiring priests to live in the parish rectory.The Washington Post reported that Stallings had allegedly misused parish funds to renovate his Anacostia house.[2] In 1988, he was transferred to a new position as a diocesan evangelist.
In the late 1980s, Stallings made numerous appearances in the news media. He was interviewed onThe Oprah Winfrey Show,Larry King Live,The Phil Donahue Show andThe Diane Rehm Show.[1] By 1989, Stallings had announced he was leaving to found a new ministry, theImani Temple African-American Catholic Congregation, breaking with theHoly See.[4] He stated that he left because Roman Catholicism did not serve the African American community or recognize talent.[5][6][7]
In 1989,The Washington Post reported that a formeraltar boy at St. Teresa of Avila Church accused Stallings of sexual misconduct over a period of several months in 1977. Stallings said "I am innocent," declining to answer questions.[5] In a follow-up series of three articles in 1990,Post reportersBill Dedman and Laura Sessions Stepp reported that concerns about Stallings' association with teenage boys had contributed to his split from the Roman Catholic Church.[8][9][10] Stallings' former pastoral assistant, who was 22 at the time, spoke publicly about having an alleged two-year sexual relationship with him.[11]
In January 1990, Stallings announced onThe Phil Donahue Show that he was breaking withpapal authority and giving up Roman Catholic teaching onabortion,contraception,homosexuality, anddivorce; Stallings considered abortion and contraception matters of individual conscience; rejected homosexual activity as a sin; and welcomed divorced or remarried Christians without an annulment.[10][12] Thirteen days prior, Stallings attested that ArchbishopJames Hickey ofWashington had ordered him to seek psychiatric treatment for an "excessive ego."[9] Hickey saw Stallings' lifestyle as extravagant and possibly funded by donations to the church.[13] Following the founding of Imani Temple, Hickey formally excommunicated Stallings and any Roman Catholics remaining in the Imani Temple movement.
Stallings was consecrated a bishop on May 12, 1990, by Richard Michael Bridges, a bishop of the American Independent Orthodox Church. He was assisted byEmil Fairfield Rodriguez of theMexican National Catholic Church and Donald Lawrence Jolly.[14] In 1991, Bridges's group conferred upon Stallings the title of archbishop.[1][13][4]
In March 1993, Stallings consecratedPaul S. Morton as a bishop for theFull Gospel Baptist Church Fellowship.[15]
In 2009, the archdiocese reached a $125,000 settlement with Gamal Awad, who said he was sexually abused at the age of 14 by Stallings and a seminarian in 1984.[11]
In 2001, Stallings married Sayomi Kamimoto, a 24-year-old native ofOkinawa, Japan, in a ceremony in New York City presided over bySun Myung Moon, the founder of theUnification Church.Emmanuel Milingo—a former Roman Catholic archbishop who was excommunicated—married a woman from South Korea at the same mass ceremony.[16] Members of the Imani Temple were so upset by Stallings' sudden announcement of his upcoming wedding that some left after services in protest of his "close affiliation with and adoption of doctrine of the Unification Church."[17]
In 2004, Stallings was a key organizer for an event in which Moon was crowned with a "crown of peace." The event was attended by a number ofmembers of the U.S. Congress, a number of whom said that they were misled. It was held at theDirksen Senate Office Building, the use of which requires a senator's approval. Stallings said the matter of who approved access was "shrouded in mystery."[18]
Stallings was national co-president of the American Clergy Leadership Conference, an affiliate of Moon's Unification Church, and active in efforts to widen Moon's influence among black clergy.[11] He regained attention in 2006 due to his association with Milingo and his groupMarried Priests Now; Milingo conditionally consecrated Stallings,Peter Paul Brennan, and two otherIndependent Catholic bishops in a ceremony in September of that year, incurring automatic excommunication.[19] Though all were denounced and excommunicated by the Roman Church, however, according to the Catholic understanding ofsacramental character, Milingo and the four men were nevertheless considered "valid but illicit." Following thisconditional sacrament, Stallings praised his second excommunication from the Roman Church.[20]
Following the January 2024 death ofPentecostal bishop andChristian universalistCarlton Pearson, Stallings denied the existence of aneternal and physical Hell.[21]
Stallings made his first leap into politics when he announced for the Ward 6D.C. Council seat in December 1996. Stallings ran under the nationalist-orientedUmoja Party.[2]
In the 1980s Father George Stallings of Washington, D.C., sought the permission of his archbishop to found an African American rite parish with a distinctive African liturgy. The archbishop denied the request, so Father Stallings left the Catholic Church and founded his own congregation, the Imani Temple, as the mother church of his African American rite.
He was suspended from the Roman Catholic Church on July 3, 1989 for establishing the independent Imani Temple, and was consecrated for the African-American Catholic Congregation in Washington, D.C., on May 12, 1990, by Richard M. Bridges of the American Independent Orthodox Church, assisted by Donald L. Jolly and Emile F. Rodriguez y Fairfield.
As a bishop, Milingo technically has the authority to ordain other bishops. But under church rules, only bishops authorized by the pope are considered bishops in good standing. The four consecrations are technically "valid" even if they are not "licit," according to the Rev. Philip Goyret, a professor of dogmatic theology with expertise in canon law at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome. That means the Vatican cannot deny the inherent authority of the newly installed bishops, even if they do not consider them in formal communion with Pope Benedict XVI. Precedence for such scenarios include the Catholic-Orthodox split in 1054 and the schism between the traditionalist followers of the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, who broke with Rome in 1988, after consecrating four priests as bishops in the Society of Pius X. "Episcopal consecrations carried out without the orders or consensus of the pontiff are valid," Goyret said.
