The Rt. Rev. Maurice H. Warnon was elected by a unanimous vote as the successor of the Rt. Rev. Tom Degenaars on Aug. 15, 2005. He was born in Uccle, Belgium on April 5, 1937, and joined the Liberal Catholic Church on Christmas Day, 1948, and was received as a Server the same day by the Rt. Rev. Ernest W. Nyssens in the Church of St John the Baptist in Brussels. After graduating from the Free University in Brussels, he met Joan M. Poortman, the daughter of the Rev. H. Ch. Poortman, the priest-in-charge of the Liberal Catholic Parish of Saint Alban in Leeuwarden, the Netherlands. They were married in that church on July 29, 1959. Drafted in the Belgian army during the Congo war, he served as Navy Chaplain and as first-line medic. After the war, Joan and Maurice lived in Ommen, the Netherlands, where he became a teacher at the international School “Eerde” located in the castle where J. Krishnamurti organized the camps of the Order of the Star. The couple returned to Belgium in 1964.

The couple returned to Belgium in 1964. Maurice was ordained to the priesthood by Bp. Augustus Goetmakers on All Saints Day, 1965. He became Vicar General for Belgium, then a diocese of the Province of the Netherlands and Belgium. He was elevated to the Episcopate on Whitsunday 1976 in Saint Michael and All Angels, Naarden, the Netherlands by the Rt. Revs. Adriaan Herman van Brakel, Augustus Willem Goetmakers, Willy de Rijk, Helenus Marinus Brandt, André Lhote, and Borge Søgaard. He served as Diocesain for Belgium from 1977 to 1988. When in 1988, Belgium gained the status of a province, Bp. Maurice served as Regionary. He became Bishop Commissary for Canada the same year. As an international consultant in Computer Sciences and Communications, he worked for a number of large corporations and organizations, such as NATO, the European Union Government, and IMBRATEL in Brazil. Fluent in several languages, Bp. Maurice combined his secular activities with the needs of the Church. He served as the representative of Bp. Sten von Krusenstierna in Portugal, Italy, the Philippines, as secretary of the JudiciaryCommittee for 14 years. In 1979, Joan and Bp. Maurice emigrated to the United States with their three sons, Michael, Jean-Marc, and Jacques. When the Belgian and Canadian Provinces decided to join the newly constituted General Episcopal Synod presided by Bp. Tom Degenaars, Bp. Maurice resigned from the General Episcopal Synod presided by Bp. Ian Hooker, but not of the Episcopate or from the Liberal Catholic Church, to remain with the members he had served for so many years. Since 2003, he has help to open a number of missions in Belarus, Cameroon, and Ukraine. He was instrumental in the reunion of the new movement with other Liberal Catholic Branches and provided Episcopal ministry to several Liberal Catholic Congregations in the United States of America and in the United Kingdom.

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