Posted on 10/20/2026 1:41:49 PM PDT by ebb tide
Denver Archbishop James Golka has ordered Father Chad Ripperger, the most widely heard living American priest on exorcism and spiritual warfare, to cease all public ministry for one year, LifeSiteNews has confirmed directly with the priest.
The order seems to cover public appearances, online homilies, and writings. Talks already booked are to be cancelled.
Ripperger was scheduled to speak at the upcoming LifeSiteNews 30th anniversary gala on April 24, 2027. He has notified us that he can no longer honor the engagement. “The Archbishop has asked me to take a break on public speaking,” he wrote. When asked to do a video address or something in writing, he also declined noting that questions on the restriction should be directed to the Archbishop of Denver. Moreover, he noted that the restrictions would be in place for a year – till next September. LifeSiteNews has also learned he has cancelled speaking engagements with at least two other organizations.
LifeSiteNews contacted the Archdiocese of Denver seeking comment on the nature, reasons, duration, and any Vatican involvement. Diocesan Director of Communications Kelly Clark has sent LifeSite the following response:
Archbishop Golka recently met with Fr. Chad Ripperger to discuss his ministry and his community, the Society of the Most Sorrowful Mother. During that conversation, the Archbishop asked Fr. Ripperger to consider a one-year fast from public speaking and interviews. The time will allow him to devote himself to the Society and to the people it serves. Fr. Ripperger readily agreed. At the end of the year, they will review the arrangement together.
Archbishop Golka is grateful for Fr. Ripperger’s priestly service, exorcism ministry, and for the generous spirit in which he received this request. We ask the faithful to join us in praying for Fr. Ripperger and for the Society.
Golka, named bishop of Colorado Springs by Pope Francis in 2021 and archbishop of Denver by Pope Leo XIV in February 2026, now holds faculties over Ripperger and the Society of the Most Sorrowful Mother (Doloran Fathers), the public association Archbishop Samuel Aquila received into the archdiocese. There has been no public decree explaining the penalty, no announced finding of heresy.
The silencing follows the achievement of the largest audience any priest has likely ever had: Ripperger recently appeared on the mega talk-shows of Tucker Carlson and Shawn Ryan.
On April 3, 2026, Ripperger sat with Carlson for nearly two hours to discuss possession, the occult, politicians and the demonic, addiction, and communism as a psychological twin of diabolic method. The full episode on Tucker’s YouTube channel got more than 3 million views and nearly 94,000 likes. Short clips continue to add millions more.
He went twice to the Shawn Ryan Show, among the top podcasts on Spotify. Episode #285 (March 5, 2026), a four-hour conversation on the mark of the beast and the rise of the Antichrist, has been reported in the 2.5 to 4.1 million view range on YouTube. The July 23 return visit, episode #324, sits around 2.7 million views; a single clip from that hour has passed 640,000. Combined with Spotify audio, the Ryan appearances alone put Ripperger in front of millions of listeners who did not come looking for a diocesan chancery statement.
READ: Shawn Ryan tells Tucker of return to Catholicism after Fr. Ripperger interview
Amazingly Ryan told Tucker that after speaking with Ripperger he has returned to his Catholic faith.
Ripperger, 61, was ordained in 1997 for the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, later founded the Doloran Fathers, and has served in the Denver archdiocese since 2016. After the 2016 death of Rome’s Chief Exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth, he became the English-speaking world’s best-known living exorcist. His books – Deliverance Prayers for Use by the Laity, Dominion, Introduction to the Science of Mental Health – have gone far and wide. Conference talks on Sensus Fidelium and related channels have been watched for years.
Archbishop Golka was appointed bishop of Colorado Springs by Pope Francis on April 30, 2021. Leo XIV named him the archbishop of Denver on February 7, 2026, accepting the resignation of Archbishop Aquila.
Chris Jackson, writing at Hiraeth in Exile (“Leo XIV’s Golka Appointment: Rewarding a Cover-Up”), argued that the Denver promotion rewarded Golka for removing the canon lawyer that took the case of the abuse victims in Chiclayo, Peru, who accused Leo XIV of coverup.
READ: Pope Leo’s secretary linked to ex-priest accused of abusing young girls
The public timeline in Colorado Springs is not in dispute. Monsignor Ricardo Coronado-Arrascue, judicial vicar and chancellor under Bishop Michael Sheridan and then under Golka, stepped down in May 2022 under a settlement that, on paper, left him a priest in good standing. In June 2023 the diocese issued a precept over an unspecified “serious allegation” and suspended him. Coronado later sued the diocese and Golka for breach of contract and defamation; the civil actions were dismissed. In May 2024, after Coronado was hired by Peruvian abuse complainants in the Chiclayo matter – the see Leo had led as Bishop Robert Prevost – Golka issued a decree branding him as under canonical investigation and forbidding him to act as an ecclesiastical lawyer.
Under Sheridan, the Diocese of Colorado Springs had two diocesan Traditional Latin Mass options: the FSSP personal parish of Immaculate Conception, which Sheridan erected, and a Friday Mass offered by Coronado at Pauline Chapel.
After Coronado’s removal there was no replacement of that TLM, leaving the FSSP the only option in the large diocese.
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Ping
Good. This guy always struck me as a self-promoting carnival barker.
“Good. This guy always struck me as a self-promoting carnival barker.”
You tube is rife with phony AI attributed to Fr Ripperger Fr. Ripperger himself discusses it in full
His website Sensus Fidelium shows his actual talks
Please watch one or any of these before opining on him
One cannot have an opinion on something they are not informed about. It is not an opinion it is just barking.
I’ve heard him speak and find what he says fascinating. I’m not a Roman Catholic, but I absolutely believe in the reality of the demonic, and he is one of the few outspoken voices I’ve heard from Christendom as of late that isn’t into kooky stuff.
I second most of stanne’s remarks. The majority of youtube videos purporting to feature Fr. Ripperger are AI slop. It took me a while to sort through the videos and reject the slop. IMO, the slop videos constitute a form of false witness against him ...
Yes, Sensus Fidelium is the real channel. He also did a few interviews with popular news/opinion pundits; those videos may also be authentic.
The problem with basing an opinion on the AI Slop videos is actually worse than being merely uninformed ... it’s based on misinformation or even disinformation.
Awful choice, but it’s to be expected in the current state of papal affairs.
The first time I saw him interviewed I found him compelling and fascinating. After I started seeing him pop up all over social media feeds, I began to be concerned that he had crossed the line from a solid religious figure to a celebrity. This time off may be warranted — for his own good and ours.
I’m of the opinion that most American’s don’t even believe the devil exists
If nothing else, Ripperger not only disabuses people of that notion, but warns them there is an active spiritual war going on.
“a form of false witness against him ...”
Quite. And anything one sees if they’re Catholic or not, that bears false witness against the Lord is, by definition, very dangerous, against the commandment and, in the case of Catholics, a sin
The vast majority of my fellow Catholics I know from childhood, not the practicing Catholics I now know, believe that it’s fine to just read and view whatever.
It is definitely not
And to listen to an AI video of a priest talking about things that are of the enemy is quite dangerous and confusing
That’s beyond what my point was, which is that in this pre mid term season I have never been more sick of listening to people hate people and institutions that they are almost completely uninformed on
They rely on 10 second or 20 minute you tubes which are at best questionable, and things people tell them- which are half the time AI. I don’t care what the education level
Yesterday I heard from a PhD yammering about her son who should know better highly educated spreading hate about some public figure based on an on line video
Hatred. And from church goers who deny they’re hating. Just illogical
They don’t get to have an opinion on what they are uninformed on and from something not only illogical to the subjects character and achievements but irrellevant
Just hate.
I’m so done with opinions tgat are uninformed hate.
“If nothing else, Ripperger not only disabuses people of that notion, but warns them there is an active spiritual war going on.”
Quite. But get his authentic talks. Even he himself has said so
“After I started seeing him pop up all over social media feeds, I began to be concerned that he had crossed the line from a solid religious figure to a celebrity. This time off may be warranted — for his own good and ours.”
Sigh. Ok let me find him telling you to stop believing that’s him.
file:///var/mobile/Library/SMS/Attachments/ff/15/11E75967-E739-4EBF-A313-CB2556E0C3E6/View%20recent%20photos.png
This is Fr Ripperger on fake AI.
This is from his website. It is authentic as far as I can tell
I certainly share your disdain for “AI Slop” ...
I also recall that misinformation and disinformation aren’t new They constitute most of what Big Media have broadcast or printed for as long as I have been alive. At least. The only real difference is that today, evil people can use AI to crank out garbage faster than is humanly possible. Worse, posting the garbage on internet sites gives it far greater longevity than previous publication methods.
It’s tricky to find that line. On one hand, if an interview gets clipped for social media and goes viral is it his fault? He has no control over how much its repurposed.
Regardless, if the discussion becomes more about him and less about the spiritual subjects it might be time for him to step back.
Again- it is against church teaching (for Catholics and like my just good advice for anyone) to not be pure what info, media and culture they take in. That is from way before AI, its before TV, radio and even the printing. Press from the Middle Ages.
“ Regardless, if the discussion becomes more about him and less about the spiritual subjects it might be time for him to step back.”
Why people want to pile on about things they have no idea about, I don’t know.
Please stop
I posted to AC a couple posts back a piece from fr Ripperger himself. Could you refer to it when opining about him in regard to AI
You’ll appear intelligent
I didn’t mention AI at all and wasn’t referring to it. I was talking about the father’s recent celebrity status. Anything outside of that was your hallucination.
Reading comprehension used to be talk in grade school, where were you?
“ I didn’t mention AI at all and wasn’t referring to it. I was talking about the father’s recent celebrity status.”
Are you referring to his talks authenticated on his website? Or the AI nonsense people believe is him self promoting?
As fake as cnn
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