Semper Amused
I will admit that I used the term Priory in an all inclusive mode. But, in all my research, the Prieure was the "slang" used to express the order.
PRIORY OF SION: THE FACTS, THE THEORIES, THE MYSTERY
Introduction
It has been seven years since I wrote my first article on the Priory of Sion/Rennes-les-Chateau mystery. At the time, I was heavily under the influence of the books Holy Blood, Holy Grail and Lionel Fanthorpe's work. Since then, there have been a number of books released, some better, some worse, than these original influences. I have revised some of my theories, challenged some of my own assumptions, learned some new things, and encountered a great deal of contrary data. Now, I am no longer sure that the hypothesis presented at the end of Holy Blood, Holy Grail is the best for explaining the data, nor am I sure that a Priory of Sion with the characteristics ascribed to it (an 800-year uninterrupted history, 9000 members internationally) really exists. I also am not sure that what is presented as "orthodox" with regard to the Sauniere saga can really be trusted. Still, although I have encountered the work of the debunkers, I am sure of two and only two things:
1. the Sauniere saga cannot be explained away simply by a mass-trafficking pyramid scheme and a bad taste in décor.
2. Something called the Order de Sion existed in the Middle Ages up until, at the latest, the 17th century; something called the Prieure du Sion existed from at least 1956 to 1984; whether these two things have any actual relationship to each other, I am still trying to figure out.
In 1099, Augustinian canons regular establish the Order of Notre Dame de Sion headquartered in the Abbey of Mt. Sion.
An 1178 papal bull by Pope Alexander claims monasteries in Calabria, the Holy Land, Sicily, and elsewhere. Some of these monks appear to have established themselves in Orleans in 1152. This Order appears to have been absorbed into the Jesuits in either 1617 or 1619, but the main source for this remains, unfortunately, Gerard de Sede's 1988 "Les Impostures".
In 1393, Ferri de Vaudemont establishes a Confraternity of Our Lady of Sion in Nancy (the Lorraine, near Sion-Vaudemont). Its relationship to the earlier Order of Sion is unknown. If and when this order ceased to exist, I am unaware.
There appear to have been two Jacobite organizations in the 18th/19th century that used this name: the Realm of Sion, founded in the 1740s, whose leader at one point was the bishop of Rodez, and which claimed descent from a 16th century order dedicated to Thomas Beckett; and a second organization, The Sovereign Sacred Religious and Military Order of Knights Protectors of the Sacred Sepulchre of Our Lord Jesus Christ and of the Most Holy Temple of Zion, founded in New Zealand in 1848.
Only one Order of Notre Dame de Sion actually appears in the Catholic Encyclopedia, and it is the Congregation of Notre Dame de Sion, founded by Marie-Alphonse Ratisbonne in Paris in 1843. This organization has parochial schools in the United States and France. One of its main goals is to convert Jews to Catholicism.
In the mid-1800s, a Czech author, Prokop Chochosoulek, wrote a work, The Templars of Bohemia. It was a work of "historical fiction". However, he does mention a Priory of Sion being behind the creation of the Templars. His reference seems to indicate they still existed in his own time.
From 1807 to 1817, the Russian mystic and Martinist I.V. Lopukhin edited a Martinist journal called The Messenger of Sion, which dealt with a variety of Jewish and mystical themes.
Although never identifying itself as an order of "Sion", an organization formed by the priestly Brothers Baillard, Eugene Michel Vintras (otherwise known as "Elias the Artist", whose mentor was a Madam Bouche who lived near St. Sulpice and went by "Sister Salome"), and the Abbe Joseph Boullan known as the Church of Carmel tried to create a syncretistic Celtic-Christian pilgrimage center at Sion-Vaudemont in the 1850s. This was written about by Lorraine author Maurice Barres in La Colline Inspiree .
In 1956, an organization called the Priory of Sion registers with the Annemasse bureau of records. Its four officers are Andre Bonhomme, president; Jean Delaval, Vice-President; Pierre Plantard, Secretary-General; Armand Defago, Treasurer. Whether this organization continued to exist after the resignation of Grand Master Pierre Plantard in 1984, no one knows.
Currently headquartered on Saint James, Long Island, is the Grand Perceptory of the Chevaliers of Notre Dame de Sion - their home page is online at this link - it claims its foundation from Marcel Lefebvre and currently says it is under the leadership of Andre Barbeau as an "Exempt Sovereign Military Religious Order". Its mission, it proclaims, is to provide medical psychiatric care to the community [sic] and also to perform interfaith marriages. Its clerical staff, it says, includes the Rev. Paul Boucher and the Rev. Douglas Trees, as well as several Rabbis listed as "Interfaith". The site is vague but would appear to indicate the order was "revitalized" in the 1980s.
Semper Fi