In 1985 Bp. Vaughan was ordained to the [Roman Catholic] priesthood at St. Michael's Church Upper Glanmire County Cork Ireland. Shortly after Ordination he left Ireland and relocated to the United States to serve the people of the Roman Catholic archdiocese of Miami Florida and the Episcopal Diocese of Florida. In 2005 he began his service in the Anglican Church in America at St. Patrick's Church in Port St. John, Florida until being appointed Vicar General of the Diocese of the Eastern United States in 2011. He is a resident of Titusville, Florida and has one son.As I observed a year ago, this thumbnail is sketchy and notable for its omissions. I've recently had reason to go back and check Bishop Vaughan's biography in greater detail, and I will add some additional material to the record in this and subsequent posts.
Pope Francis is recently reported to have acknowledged, at least informally, that there is in fact a gay mafia in the Roman Catholic Church:
[In} the Curia, there are also holy people, really, there are holy people. But there also is a stream of corruption, there is that as well, it is true... The "gay lobby" is mentioned, and it is true, it is there... We need to see what we can do...The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami is frequently mentioned as a center for gay mafia activity in the US. This is often suggested as a reason for the premature removal of Archbishop John C. Favalora prior to his mandatory retirement at age 75. Although he was installed as Archbishop of Miami in 1994, discussions of the scandals in the Miami Archdiocese indicate that the problems there had existed for decades prior to his arrival.
Priests speak, too, about the culture of "sex-driven favoritism" at St. John Vianney College Seminary—a kind of gay Hogwarts with palm trees, located out in the flat suburban wastes of southwest Dade County. . . . One seminarian who dropped out in disgust in the 1980s recalls a miserable year being bullied by gay faculty, and the rector, Robert Lynch, fawning over his favorite seminarian: an attractive upper-classman named Steven O'Hala.It's worth pointing out that the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami was also the place where the "Father Oprah" scandal took place, wherein Alberto Cutie, a Catholic priest well-known for his media appearances, was forced to leave the Catholic priesthood after publication of pictures in which he was shown kissing Ruhama Buni Canellis at a public beach. (He later married Ms Buni Canellis and became an Episcopal priest.)
There is no record of what John Vaughan's activities may or may not have been in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami during the time he was a priest there. According to this article in the Lakeland, FL Ledger, Vaughan had disagreed with Catholic doctrine while in seminary, and after transferring to the Miami archdiocese in 1985, by 1990 reached a decision that he could not continue as a Catholic priest. The "doctrines" with which he disagreed, according to the article, included, but apparently were not limited to, the requirement of priestly celibacy. (Priestly celibacy, however, is a "discipline", not a "doctrine"; Vaughan, who has a Master's degree in theology, was presumably aware of this.)
However, although Vaughan disagreed with not fully specified Catholic doctrines, he had not met anyone whom he might have considered marriage material before he left the Catholic priesthood. This would change.
According to the Florida Department of Health, John Vaughan married Rebecca Susan Fein in Miami on 22 June 1991. The Lakeland Ledger story indicates that Rebecca Fein's parents are Leslie and Ellen Spoor of Winter Haven, FL. According to the Florida Department of Health, Rebecca Susan Spoor married Beatty Scott Blanton III on 31 August 1974. According to the Florida Department of Health, Rebecca Susan Blanton had another marriage, to Louis Ira Fein, on 15 October 1983. A third marriage for Rebecca Susan Spoor is listed for 22 June 1991, which is presumably the marriage of Rebecca Susan Fein to John Vaughan, her third.
The story, though, doesn't end here.
