The filing cabinet
While the O.T.O.’s initiatory system is a sort of Kafkaesque bureaucratic club game, it has a religious association as part of its framework: the Gnostic Catholic Church. The O.T.O. intends “to restore Christianity to its real status as a solar-phallic religion”.
The technical term for the bishopric in the context of the O.T.O. Phenomenon is Wandering Bishops or Episcopi Vagantes. This status is not defined by qualities of character, by theological education, or by theological position. These bishops are not elected by a canonical church, nor presented for ordination by a suffragan, nor bound to a historical episcopal see, nor consecrated by an “official” bishop according to canonical procedure.
A “real” bishop is not the successor of a sole apostle, since only the synod, or college of bishops in toto, is heir to the college of the apostles.
Gnostic Gnollections
In the “Caliphate’s” church newsletter Gnostic Gnews, Vol. 1 Nº 3, California, 1989, page 4, the “Caliphate” claims suppositious lines of apostolic succession.
“May 29, 1882 Bishop Julius Alvarez consecrated Msgr. Joseph René Vilatte.
December 19, 1915 Bishop Vilatte consecrated Msgr. Gregory Lines.
December 21, 1927 Bishop Lines consecrated Msgr. Joseph A. Justin Boyle. Bishop Byole consecrated Msgr. Paul Wadle.
April 1, 1960 Bishop Wadle consecrated Msgr. W.W. Webb.
November 4, 1967 Bishop Webb consecrated Msgr. Marc A. Lully.
December 25, 1967 Bishop Lully consecrated Msgr. Michael P. Bertiaux.
1971 Bishop Bertiaux consecrated Msgr. Jack B. Hogg Jr.
August 12, 1974 Bishop Hogg Jr. consecrated Msgr. Tav Silenius” [= William Breeze]
But: The Gnostic Links
William Wallace Webb consecrated Marc Lully by letter in 1967; Lully then introduced Michael Paul Bertiaux into this succession. The highly complex links between Ronald Powell, who also called himself “Richard Duc de Palatine”, Herman Adrian Spruit, Lowell Paul Wadle, Stephan A. Hoeller and Forest Ernest Barber have had to be omitted on grounds of space.
Jack B. Hogg Jr. was ordained on June 2nd 1968 by Bertiaux, assisted by Lully. He was consecrated again on July 24th 1970 by Bertiaux, Frank Lopez O’Brien and Antonio Paez. On August 15th 1973 Bertiaux’ Ordo Templi Orientis Antiqua [O.T.O.A.] officially accepted the Law of Thelema. On August 12th 1974 Hogg ordained William Breeze — today the “Caliph”. Again, on July 27th 1980, Hogg was ordained by Bertiaux and Jean-Maine. Breeze himself makes no appearance in the O.T.O.A. journals produced at this time: The Mirror of Misraim, after 1974 Labyrinthos, and then Instrumentum.
Documents: William Wallace Webb. Frater Damon, Hermetic Alchemical Order of the QBLH, Philosophic Gnostic Hermetic Society, Qabalistic Alchemist Church, Ordo Argenteum Astrum.
W.W. Webb stated: “I did give Bertiaux and Lully confirmation to Bishop, by letter, so they would be Legal in the state of Illinois, to satisfy them at that time [...] 1966 or 67.”
“Wadle never made me a Bishop.”
Corroborated by Stephan A. Hoeller, who was ordained a priest by Wadle in 1959: “I consider it prima facie impossible that Bishop L.P. Wadle consecrated W.W. Webb.” Letter of 22.1.90.
When Doves Cry
Allen Greenfield, LiveJournal, 27 September 2006.A witness: [...] “the point of all this is that through a certain point Bill [Breeze] was utterly convinced of the importance of the Apostolic Succession, and David [Scriven] all the more so. I don’t know *exactly* what happened, but Bill seems to have ‘freaked’ at the Webb-isn’t-a-bishop stuff from Herr Koenig” [...].
In 1993 Breeze introduced, retroactively to 1991, that O.T.O. degrees and episcopal dignities must be interdependent, that bishops should have at least VII° and vice versa. He incorporated a short version of a Gnostic Mass into his VIII° ritual.
Another consequence is: Breeze realized that there is “no evidence in Crowley’s or Reuss’ papers” that “support the usage ‘Bishop’ in O.T.O.” (The Magical Link 5;3, published February 1992, p. 1.) This Gnostic slap in the face burns for a year, until in the spring of 1993, even retroactively to October 1, 1991, the Holy Spirit, which plays a rôle in episcopal ordinations, is re-regulated in the “Caliphate” and associated with their VII°s: “Only Initiate Members of at least Seventh Degree are eligible for recognition as Bishops within the Ecclesiastical Class of membership in the O.T.O. Bishops recognized prior to this date need not be members of the Seventh Degree.” (Minutes of the Areopagus meeting, April 3, 1993.)
William Breeze on 16th February 1997 to Marcelo A.C. Santos: “P-R Koenig is an idiot.”
The Magical Link III;4, page 27.William Breeze: “To a Catholic theologian this consecration was invalid on any number of doctrinal points. These include lack of preparedness (I had not been ordained a priest); lack of ‘intention’ (I was not consciously aware at the time of what was being done); supposed ‘gaps’ in the the [sic] underlying succession (one of two of my consecrator’s antecedents had apparently been consecrated by mail, on the astral, or both), etc. etc. I don’t particularly care, and for good reason. It is not on the historical ‘apostolic succession’ (as defined by Christian theologians) that my consecrator was possessed of the ‘afflatus,’ pneuma, ‘cosmic consciousness,’ energized enthusiasm, or whatever you wish to term it, necessary to true gnostic consecration. It is this essential energy that the Gnostic Mass was designed to induce in its officers. Their success in this is the key to the efficacy of the Mass.”
Allen Greenfield, LiveJournal, 27 September 2006. See also My Own O.T.O.A.“As nearly as I can tell, the OTO changed its ‘party line’ on the Apostolic Succession based almost solely on the critique of Herr Peter Koenig” [...].
“Thereafter, he [Breeze] tended to dismiss the whole idea, though as late as the 1990s he himself was making bishops [...] There is reason to believe he may well have been validly consecrated by Marc Lully and perhaps Mother Serena (so was his QBLH successor, Soror Tala)” [...].
Allen Greenfield, LiveJournal, 27 September 2006, barking up the wrong tree.“The Apostolic Succession is probably at least two thousand years of magical power being transferred under cover of religion. It is probably much, much older. As an egregore, it is formidable, and if the OTO upper management dismissed it because Herr Koenig complained about a ‘weak link’ it is a tribute to Koenig’s power and to Breeze’s and Scriven’s intellectual and moral cowardice.” [...]
[...] “Koenig’s ‘case’ is mere propaganda. The right and wrong of it is less important than the illustration of the mopral [sic] and intellectual cowardace [sic] of ‘the great leaders’ in the face of what seems to have been the rather shallow opinions of one Swiss crank.”