Nov, 24, 2000: Vatican Lays Down Exorcism Law (BBC News)
QuoteThe Catholic Church has issued strict new rules governing exorcism - the casting out of devils.
Vatican insiders say the guidelines - which include getting permission from a bishop, and discouraging media coverage - are aimed at controlling a popular African bishop who lives in Rome. ...
The "instruction" from the Vatican says that it is legitimate to pray for relief from suffering, but says that exorcisms must be carried out according to the letter of the law laid down in 1999 - the first update of the exorcism service since 1614. The rules also specify that group meetings to pray for healing should not be organised around the cult of an individual, which Vatican observers see as a clear reference to Mr Milingo.
May 27, 2001: Archbishop Marries in Moon Ceremony (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1355126.stm) (BBC)
QuoteA controversial Roman Catholic Archbishop who has long been an embarrassment to the Vatican has married a Korean woman in a group wedding conducted by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon. ... The bride - identified as Sung Ryae Soon, from South Korea - was chosen for him earlier in the week, said a spokesman for Moon's movement. ... The maverick Catholic was archbishop of Lusaka, Zambia, until 1983, when he resigned under pressure from Rome - an almost unprecedented event. The Vatican objected to allegations that he carried out faith healings and exorcisms and brought him to Rome to make it easier to keep an eye on him.
Aug 11, 2001: Married Archbishop 'Set to Rejoin Church (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/1486260.stm) (BBC News)
QuoteThe Vatican has announced that Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, the former head of the Roman Catholic Church in Zambia, under threat of excommunication for breaking his vow of celibacy, intends to return to full communion with the Church. The Vatican's watchdog department, which deals with heretics and schismatics, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, released a statement in Rome.
It said the African archbishop, as a result of being personally reminded by Pope John Paul II last Tuesday of his responsibility towards God and the Church, is now spending a period of reflection and prayer with a view to full reconciliation.
Aug. 24, 2001: Archbishop Milingo Renounces Wife (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1508385.stm) (BBC News)
QuoteThe Zambian cleric, Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo of Lusaka, went on Italian TV to say he would still love his South Korean wife "as a sister" but had to "return to the fold".It was the first time the archbishop had appeared in public in over two weeks and he read out what he said was an unsent letter to his estranged wife, Maria Sung, in which he explained why their marriage was over. But Mrs Milingo, who is still on a protest hunger-strike in Rome, responded by saying she would fast to the death.
"My Mother the Catholic Church has appealed to me to return to the fold," the archbishop quoted from his letter, which he said officials from the Unification Church of the Reverend Moon had prevented from reaching Mrs Milingo. Asked if he thought that his wife would understand, he said she was "not a girl - she's an adult".
"It's not possible, it's not possible," she told reporters after Friday's broadcast. "He's been drugged, he's been drugged." Mrs Milingo launched her fast to demand a meeting with her husband whom she said the Vatican had kidnapped.She has now said in a radio interview that she will fast to the death and love the archbishop "for the rest of my life".
Aug. 30, 2001: Catholic Archbishop Meets with Estranged Wife (https://www.voanews.com/a/a-13-a-2001-08-30-27-catholic-66263477/539211.html) (VOA News)
QuoteZambian Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, who scandalized the Roman Catholic Church by marrying, met with his wife Wednesday for the first time in more than three weeks. Archbishop Milingo explained his reasons for leaving her. His Korean wife said she accepted his decision.
A heart-broken Maria Sung ended her hunger strike after 16 days. She finally managed to obtain her much-requested meeting with Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, whom she married in a ceremony organized by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon of the South Korean Unification Church in New York City last May. The emotional meeting took place in a Rome hotel and lasted three hours.
The 71-year-old Archbishop did not ask for forgiveness, but handed his 43-year-old Korean wife a handwritten letter explaining why he chose to leave her. "My commitments in the life of the Church, including celibacy, do not allow me to be married," he explained. "The calling from my Church is my primary commitment and the right one," he wrote in the letter.
Oct. 2, 2002: Return of the Prodigal Son (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/oct/02/worlddispatch.italy) (The Guardian)
QuoteArchbishop Emmanuel Milingo, the Zambian faith healer who ran off and married a Moonie, sealed his reconciliation with the Roman Catholic church and Italian society this week by appearing on an influential television talk show to say he was sorry. As is customary on these occasions, he was also promoting a book: the account of his fall - which riveted the world's press in the summer of 2001 - and redemption, which removed him from television screens for more than a year.
In Monday's interview, Archbishop Milingo explained how the sense of isolation and frustration - caused by official Vatican suspicion of his unorthodox religious practices - threw him into the Rev Moon's (and Maria Sung's) suffocating embrace. He had not found the charity and maternal affection that he expected of the Catholic church, he said, enunciating the words with vehement intensity. He had agreed to marry a woman of the Rev Moon's choice not out of a desire to challenge the Vatican's teaching on priestly celibacy but simply because it was the condition set by the Moonies for him to be allowed to preach the gospel message among them.
"I may have been subjected to a kind of brainwashing," he said in his book-length interview with the Italian journalist Michele Zanzucchi. He explained that the Moonies were planning to establish a schismatic Catholic church in Africa, to be led by the charismatic Zambian rebel and to include other married priests and bishops. A document outlining the project mysteriously disappeared from his suitcase on his return to Italy, he said.
Maria Sung was scornful of his explanations. In a recorded interview broadcast on the programme, she said even a child would have difficulty believing them. "We got married before the whole world. Milingo was perfectly sane then. Perhaps he has gone mad now," she suggested. The Vatican and the followers of the Rev Moon's Unification church have accused one another of coercing the archbishop's will, swapping accusations of kidnapping, drugging, hypnotising or otherwise brainwashing the unfortunate cleric.
Sept. 29, 2006: Pope Expels the Exorcist Archbishop (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/sep/29/worlddispatch.italy) (The Guardian)
QuoteEmmanuel Milingo, once the archbishop of Lusaka in Zambia, has been in and out of trouble for more than 20 years now. In 1983, he was hauled to Rome because of concern over his ministry, which had aspects the Vatican felt were uncomfortably close to faith healing. ... A gifted singer, he released a recording of African folk songs. Then he made waves by endorsing the claims of an African nun who said she regularly saw the face of Jesus.
All the time, he was building up a solid following within Italy. Thousands of people showed up for his monthly masses at a former warehouse on the outskirts of Milan - ceremonies at which he performed exorcisms in which the faithful writhed and shouted. In 1996, when the archbishop of Milan told him to stop, more than 4,500 people signed a petition calling for the ban to be lifted.
Jan. 19, 2012: Archdiocese Warns Against Meetings with Archbishop Milingo (https://www.archbalt.org/archdiocese-warns-against-meetings-with-archbishop-milingo/) (The Archdiocese of Baltimore)
QuoteThe Seoul Archdiocese has cautioned Catholics against meeting or consulting with an excommunicated African archbishop residing in South Korea. Lay Catholics are to consult with their parish priests if they are invited to any meeting with Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, former archbishop of Lusaka, Zambia, the Sept. 9 archdiocesan bulletin advised.
The Asian church news agency UCA News reported the bulletin told Catholics, "Former Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, who married a member of the Unification Church and caused a scandal, was excommunicated by the Vatican."
The bulletin pointed out that the excommunicated archbishop is promoting his U.S.-based Married Priests Now! movement in South Korea. The movement that he founded in July 2006 advocates that the Roman Catholic Church allow married priests in active ministry. Under church law, Latin-rite Catholic priests must remain unmarried and are bound to celibacy.
Father Peter Pai Young-ho, secretary-general of the Korean bishops' conference, told UCA News Sept. 12 that "since Milingo is excommunicated, he has no authority to gather former Catholic priests or facilitate their Catholic priestly ministry."
In September 2006, two days after Archbishop Milingo ordained four bishops without papal approval, the Vatican declared that all five incurred automatic excommunication because of the illicit act. Father Pai said the excommunicated archbishop fraternizes with Catholics and visits Catholic institutions as though he still holds episcopal office.
"It was reported that he has shown himself in Catholic archbishop's attire and held prayer meetings with local Catholics in several shrines in the country," the priest said. "The shrine authorities, who did not recognize him, welcomed him, thinking he was a foreign archbishop visiting Korea," Father Pai added.
Aug. 14, 2013: Excommunicated Archbishop Milingo Continues to Build Schismatic Movement in Africa (https://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=18749&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A%20CatholicWorldNewsFeatureStories%20%28Catholic%20World%20News%20%28on%20CatholicCulture.org%29%29) (Catholic Culture)
July 23, 2019: Canonisation of Eldoret Nun Who Allegedly Photographed Jesus, Shed Tears of Blood Gathers Steam (https://www.tuko.co.ke/311098-canonisation-eldoret-nun-allegedly-photographed-jesus-tears-blood-gathers-steam.html)
QuoteInformation hitherto availed to the Church indicates the nun was a sickly girl who was in 1983, at 17, miraculously healed by Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo in Nairobi.
Dec. 2025: The Intriguing Story of Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo (Godfrey I. Onah/Catholic Diocese of Nsukka)