In a major development for the traditional Catholic world, Bishop Pierre Roy has announced that Father Michael Mary Sim, founder and rector major of the Transalpine Redemptorists, will be consecrated a bishop on July 25, 2026, at the community’s monastery on Papa Stronsay in the Orkney Islands of Scotland.
According to the announcement, Bishops Rodrigo Ribeiro da Silva and Fernando Altamira will serve as co-consecrators. Both hold that the Seat of St. Peter is currently vacant. The ceremony will take place privately within the monastery.
Integrity has reached out to Roy, Mary, and other relevant parties for comment and will publish their responses in due course.
The announcement comes only weeks after the Transalpine Redemptorists, officially the Congregation of the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer, publicly declared that the Holy See is vacant and rejected the legitimacy of the post-conciliar claimants to the papacy in their statement “The Dogma To Steer By.” The community was previously associated with both the Society of St. Pius X and the Conciliar Church. The consecration represents one of the most significant developments yet arising from their dramatic shift in position.
Integrity co-founder Stephen Kokx interviewed Mary in May. Mary told him that the local ordinary, Aberdeen Bishop Hugh Gilbert, OSB, has opened a “penal process” against him.
In his June 18 letter, Roy explained that he had been in close contact with the community since June 2025 and had concluded that the Redemptorists required their own bishop due to their international apostolate. The community presently has houses in Scotland, New Zealand, and the United States, while also serving faithful in Australia, Samoa, and elsewhere.
“Since my confreres are in similar situations to my own, it seemed reasonable and necessary to give the Redemptorists a bishop who could properly care for a flock that already knew the sound of his fatherly voice,” Roy wrote.
His Excellency also addressed what many traditional Catholics will regard as the obvious question: whether a community that spent years under the authority of the post-conciliar hierarchy can be trusted with the episcopacy.
“They could have returned to their old errors, but instead chose to undertake a serious study of the Church’s situation. This study, which I have been able to consult, led them to recognize the current vacancy of the Apostolic See and to embrace the only attitude compatible with the Catholic Faith in the face of conciliar apostasy,” he said.
Roy, who resigned from the SSPX in 2016, continued: “Last year I received their Profession of Faith, which I wished to recite with them, and we have since collaborated until their recent declaration, in which they put an end to all ambiguity by affirming before the entire Church their Faith and their rejection of modern errors along with their perpetrators.”
Who are the Transalpine Redemptorists?
The history of the Transalpine Redemptorists has been anything but ordinary. The community was founded in the late 1980s under the leadership of Father Michael Mary with the blessing of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre. For many years it operated within the orbit of the Society of Saint Pius X and established its famous monastery on the remote island of Papa Stronsay.
In 2008, however, the community reconciled with Rome under Benedict XVI. For nearly two decades, they functioned as a “canonically recognized” traditional institute, eventually receiving diocesan approval and expanding internationally.
That arrangement began to unravel in recent years amid conflicts with church authorities and growing theological concerns regarding the post-conciliar hierarchy. In October 2025, public reports emerged that serious tensions had developed between the community and diocesan authorities.
The Dispatch
The decisive break came on May 2, 2026, when the Redemptorists released a declaration concluding that they could no longer recognize the post-Vatican II claimants to the papacy. The declaration argued that their 2008 reconciliation had been based on the inherited SSPX position of “recognize and resist,” a position they now regard as untenable.
Bishop Roy echoes this interpretation in his new letter: “By making their ‘reconciliation’ in 2008, the Redemptorists primarily sought to end a situation incompatible with the Catholic Faith: that of recognising a person as the true Supreme Pontiff and yet resisting him in matters of faith, morals, and discipline.”
He further states: “Having had the opportunity to closely observe the nauseating stench of the conciliar hydra until 2024, God provided them with the circumstances to rectify the situation through the persecutions they suffered because of their refusal to compromise the sacred Traditions of the Church.”
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Bishop Roy has emerged as one of the more prominent voices within the contemporary sedevacantist movement.
Ordained for the SSPX in 2011, he spent five years in the Society before departing in 2016 over concerns that the SSPX leadership was moving toward greater integration with the post-conciliar hierarchy. He subsequently founded Our Lady of Joy Mission in eastern Canada.
In January 2024, he was consecrated by Bishop Rodrigo Ribeiro da Silva, who was previously associated with Bishop Richard Williamson and the SSPX “Resistance.” Since then, Roy has advocated the position that traditional bishops possess not merely sacramental powers but also extraordinary jurisdiction supplied by Christ during the present crisis in the Church. That conviction is clearly visible in the new announcement.
Roy acknowledges that he cannot personally grant jurisdiction to Fr. Mary but insists that Christ Himself provides what is necessary: “Christ, the invisible head of the Church and source of all jurisdiction, can, and He certainly will in the limits of the present necessities of the Church, in the absence of a true Supreme Pontiff.”
The consecration arrives amid increasing discussion of what some traditional Catholics call an “Imperfect General Council.” The concept, promoted by Roy, the Unam Sanctam initiative, and other sedevacantist thinkers, argues that in an extended papal vacancy the Church possesses extraordinary means to address the crisis and ultimately restore the papacy. The Transalpine Redemptorists themselves called for such an imperfect council in their May declaration.
Roy has likewise spoken publicly about the possibility, telling Kokx in an interview that the Church cannot be permanently deprived of the means necessary for her own preservation.
The consecration of Fr. Mary will inevitably be viewed as strengthening the network of bishops and clergy who believe that extraordinary measures may eventually be required to resolve the present ecclesiastical crisis.
In his letter, Roy insists that traditional Catholics cannot be content merely to preserve the sacraments while modernist bishops occupy the field. “Church history shows that heretical bishops are combated by establishing Catholic bishops, just as impostor popes are combated by a true pope,” he has said.
Whether one agrees with that assessment or not, the significance of the upcoming consecration is undeniable. The founder of one of the most well-known traditional religious communities in the English-speaking world is set to become a bishop. It follows the community’s formal embrace of sedevacantism and places the Transalpine Redemptorists squarely within the camp seeking not simply to resist the post-conciliar revolution, but to provide what they believe are the structures necessary for the restoration of the Church.
As stated above, Integrity has reached out to various parties of interest pertaining to this story. We will publish their responses when we receive them.
