Setting the record straight about Fr. Ian Taylor

I am a parishioner at St. Peter’s Catholic Church. We have had a wonderful visiting priest with us for the past six months. His name is Fr. Ian Taylor. When he celebrated mass, “did not our hearts burn within us?” The Gospel and our beautiful Catholic faith infused us with the joy of our salvation through Jesus Christ.

Last week in our church bulletin we were informed that Fr. Ian is leaving the parish. Fr. Bud thanked him for his time here and affirmed that “Fr. Taylor is a good and holy priest.” In a phone conversation with Fr. Bud, I worried that people would start speculating that Fr. Ian was leaving early because he had done something wrong. Fr. Bud quickly assured me that Fr. Ian was a good priest and had done nothing wrong.

The reason for my letter is that two weeks ago I heard that someone had said that Fr. Ian was a disobedient priest in his home diocese of Trinidad. I found that hard to believe, so I wrote Archbishop Gilbert in Trinidad. I asked him if Fr. Taylor was a disobedient priest and he responded to me the following:

“I can assure you that Father Taylor is a priest in good standing in the Archdiocese of Port of Spain.”

And today I heard that someone else is telling people that Fr. Ian is in bad standing in the Diocese of San Diego and is not allowed to administer the sacraments. In other words, he is in big trouble with our own Bishop Brom. So, I called down to our diocese and was told Fr. Ian was not in trouble with our Bishop at all. The Chancellor of our diocese told me that Fr. Ian has faculties to administer the sacraments from his Archbishop in Port of Spain, Trinidad. The Chancellor also affirmed that our diocese has documents that Fr. Ian Taylor is in good standing with his home diocese.

I don’t know why people are spreading these lies about Fr. Ian Taylor. In the interest of truth and defending the reputation of Fr. Taylor, I am writing this letter to the newspaper so others who might hear these rumors won’t believe them.