In my ongoing studies of alternative popes, that is, people who claim that they, not the vastly more recognized man in Rome, are the pontiff, I have also encountered a few people who, based on private apparitions, claim they are destined to become the pope sometime in the future. They are alternative popes in the making. One of them was Hungarian-German Franz Engelhardt, who did so from the early 1970s onward. Another is Australian William Kamm, better known as Little Pebble, who in the 1980s began to claim to be the future Petrus Romanus, the pope of the end times.
A third person who claimed a future papacy from the late 1980s or early 1990s onward was Gary Michael McLaughlin (1950-2023). He was a traditionalist independent Catholic priest known by many aliases: Father Jean Claude Joseph, Father Peter, Brother Michael O’Connell, and, most prominently, Father X.
Following a common modus operandi among alternative popes, McLaughlin tried to associate himself with, or take over, Marian shrines not recognized by the official Roman Catholic Church. These shrines should serve as nodes for his ministry and attract potential followers. McLaughlin and his small group of followers vehemently opposed the Second Vatican Council and the Novus Ordo Mass. From the early 1980s, McLaughlin claimed to receive messages from the Virgin Mary and Christ, and according to his followers, he also received the stigmata.
There is scarce and conflicting information about McLaughlin’s life until the 1980s. We know that he grew up in California. Though he later claimed to have had a full seminary education, his only formal religious education seems to have been a year at a preparatory seminary, from which he graduated in 1969. By 1980, he wanted to join a Roman Catholic order, but instead, he became associated with the shrine at Necedah, Wisconsin, which the official Catholic Church had repeatedly condemned.
At the time, the apocalyptic community of Necedah was ministered by independent Catholic clergy. On 6 June 1981, McLaughlin was ordained a priest by Francis DiBenedetto, a bishop of a jurisdiction known as the Catholic Church, Old Roman Rite-Old Catholic Church. However, McLaughlin soon clashed with his bishop and was excommunicated. In 1983, he lived in Cincinnati, claiming to receive messages from the Virgin Mary and other celestial beings. In one apparition, the Virgin told him to found a male religious order, the Franciscan Penitents of the Virgin Mary, and another congregation for women, known as the Poor Clares of Reparation. He had a small group of adherents and began sending out newsletters containing celestial messages and appeals for donations.
In 1983, McLaughlin heard about a shrine in the tiny town of Orrin, North Dakota, and in 1984, he and his group moved there. The informal outdoor shrine in Orrin, called the Mary, Center of America Shrine, was located near the geographic center of North America. In this almost entirely Catholic context Wendelin Bickler and his twin brother Joseph M. Buechler started constructing the shrine on his property during the Second World War and completed it in 1954. It received small groups of pilgrims who gathered to say the rosary.
The newly arrived group in Orrin had grand plans. They wanted to build a church, a seminary, a convent, a home for single mothers, and an orphanage in this little town with fewer than 50 inhabitants. The local parish priest and the bishop of Fargo arrived in Orrin to speak with the group, but they were chased away with holy water. The diocese made clear that there was no indication that McLaughlin had been ordained a Roman Catholic priest and that it considered him an imposter.
The Shrine in Orrin, North Dakota
In 1986, McLaughlin moved to North Carolina and, the following year, relocated to New Mexico where he tried to raise money to fund a non-existent hospice. Still, in 1987, McLaughlin was arrested for mail and wire fraud and extradited to North Dakota. He entered a plea agreement in which he pleaded guilty to having collected funds for non-existent religious institutions. In the end, he served only half a year in prison. McLaughlin was arrested on multiple occasions, both before and after this time, but this was the only prison sentence he got.
The group’s center in Cañon, New Mexico
While Father X was in New Mexico, some of his followers stayed in Orrin, still trying to secure the shrine there. In 1988, Bickler’s neighbors purchased his property, including the shrine. The new owners tried to hinder Father X’s group from trespassing and clearly opposed any takeover. At this time, the group had acquired an old Lutheran church building that they wanted to move near the shrine, but to no avail.
Although Gary McLaughlin had promised the authorities that he would not continue his priestly ministry, he would soon pursue his modus operandi, seeking to secure a new shrine. In 1990, he joined forces with a New Zealand-originating medical doctor, who acquired a former Nazarene church in New Rockford, North Dakota, which was renamed Our Lady of Victory International Shrine. Thereafter, McLaughlin used donations to purchase a farm outside Karlsruhe, North Dakota, where he intended to build a monastery. In 1993, the press reported on a conflict between the doctor, who wanted to build a basilica in New Rockford, and McLaughlin, who wanted to found the monastery near Karlsruhe.
In one of his early-1990s newsletters, McLaughlin quoted a long message from Christ about his end-time papacy. McLaughlin closely linked the messages he claimed to receive to the much-debated apocalyptic messages received by Veronica Lueken at Bayside in Queens, New York. Just like another future alternative pope of the time, William Kamm, McLaughlin also claimed that his mission was to connect all seers in the world, that is, all people who received heavenly messages. Those who did not join him would perish. The prophecy of the papacy reads as follows.
“The Great Pontiff of the future shall be an American and come from the Shrine in North Dakota. I see the pontiff and I am amazed. He rules the Church with the tenderness of a Shepherd and the iron rod and smites the enemies of Church with his breath…. Oh! It is horrible. I now see the destruction of those seers and laity who refuse to unite with this shrine. I see the Bishops and Cardinals and Priests being executed in the Chastisement. I see Veronica Leuken [the seer of Bayside] in a turmoil, Satan buffeting her for a small space. I now see Veronica saying: “Yes Father McLaughlin is the future pontiff. . . obey only Seers that are united with Orrin, ND and Bayside. I am in union… total union with you Father and you shall lead all Seers worldwide.”
Though we have no clear sources to McLaughlin’s activities after the 1990s, he remained in the area until his death in 2023.
Sources:
The Albuquerque Journal, 27 May 1987.
The Forum (Fargo), 10 April 1988, 4 November 1993, and 29 Oct 1994.
The Grand Forks Herald, 9 September 1984, 19 August 1987, 29 December 1991, 5 January 1992, 30 January 1993, 30 January 1993, 20 March 1994
Thomas W. Case “The Tridentine Rite Conference and Its Schismatic Cousins (Part 1)”, Fidelity, February 1993.
Magnus Lundberg 