Former Melbourne priest Greg Reynolds believes a widely publicised incident last year in which part of a Communion host was given to a dog by its owner during Mass at a breakaway church may have been a decisive factor in the priest’s expulsion from the Church, writes Mark Brolly.
Mr Reynolds, who was excommunicated and laicised in May but whose penalties were revealed only last month, said the incident in August 2012 – of which he said he was unaware until after the Mass – was mentioned in a meeting with Melbourne canon lawyer Fr John Salvano to which he was summoned on 18 September this year.
He was informed at that meeting that he had been laicised and excommunicated and was given a Notice of Dismissal and Excommunication from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) dated 31 May under the name of Pope Francis, then in the first weeks of his pontificate. The document gives no reasons why Mr Reynolds was dismissed from the priesthood and expelled from the Church but refers to his “reproachful behaviour”.
Mr Reynolds said Fr Salvano, the dean of Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral, had translated the Latin document for him, a version of which is published on the website of Inclusive Catholics, the organisation Mr Reynolds established when he resigned as a parish priest in August 2011. He said he had been told that Archbishop Denis Hart of Melbourne had not gone on to apply for his laicisation and he did not know who had complained about him to the CDF.
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