The terms Old Catholic Church, Old Catholics, Old-Catholic churches or Old Catholic movement designate "any of the groups of Western Christians who believe themselves to maintain in complete loyalty the doctrine and traditions of the undivided church but who separated from the see of Rome after the First Vatican council of 1869–70".
The Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands, sometimes Jansenist Church of Holland, is an Old Catholic jurisdiction originating from the Archdiocese of Utrecht (695–1580). The Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands is the mother church of the Old Catholic Union of Utrecht.
Bernardus Johannes Alfrink was a Dutch Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of Utrecht from 1955 to 1975, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1960.
Gerardus Gul served as the seventeenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1892 to 1920. He is known for his role in assisting the persons who would later found the Polish National Catholic Church in the United States, as well as for consecrating Arnold Harris Mathew, the founder and first bishop of the Old Catholic Church in Great Britain.
The Lordship of Utrecht was formed in 1528 when Charles V of Habsburg conquered the Bishopric of Utrecht, during the Guelders Wars.
Dominique-Marie Varlet was a French prelate and missionary of the Catholic Church who served as vicar general of the Diocese of Quebec. Later, as the Roman Catholic Bishop of Babylon, he caused a schism within the Roman Catholic Church by consecrating four men successively as Archbishop of Utrecht.
The Old Catholic Archdiocese of Utrecht is an archdiocese within the Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands which split from the Archdiocese of Utrecht officially in 1723 because of the illicit consecration of Cornelius van Steenoven to the episcopate.
The Old Roman Catholic Church in Great Britain is an independent Catholic church claiming descent from Arnold Harris Mathew in 1910.
Cornelis van Steenoven was a Dutch Roman Catholic priest who later served as the seventh Old Catholic Archbishop of Utrecht from 1724 to 1725. Consecrated without the permission of the pope, Steenoven was at the center of the 18th-century controversy between national churches and what many considered to be the overreaching powers of the papacy.
Cornelius Johannes Barchman Wuytiers served as the Old Catholic Archbishop of Utrecht from 1725 to 1733.
Theodorus van der Croon (1668–1739) served as the ninth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1734 to 1739.
Petrus Johannes Meindaerts served as the tenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1739 to 1767. After the death of his consecrator, Bishop Dominique Marie Varlet, Meindaerts consecrated other bishops, such that all later Old Catholic bishops derive their apostolic succession from him.
Johannes Jacobus van Rhijn served as the twelfth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1797 to 1808.
Willibrord van Os served as the thirteenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1814 to 1825.
Johannes van Santen served as the fourteenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1825 to 1858. He was part of the last attempt of the Church of Utrecht to reconcile with the Roman Catholic Church at that time.
Henricus Loos served as the fifteenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1858 to 1873. Together with Bishop Hermann Heykamp of Deventer, Loos is known as one of only two bishops whose orders were recognized by the Roman Catholic Church, but who were not invited to the First Vatican Council. Loos served as Archbishop of Utrecht during the first two Old Catholic Congresses in Munich in 1871 and in Cologne in 1872.
Johannes Heykamp served as the sixteenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1875 to 1892. A learned theologian, Heykamp is most remembered for summoning the conference that led to the Declaration of Utrecht.
Franciscus Kenninck served as the eighteenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1920 to 1937.
Andreas Rinkel was a Dutch priest who served as the nineteenth Archbishop of Utrecht from 1937 to 1970.
