[1][2]: 1–2 David V. Barrett, in the Encyclopedia of New Religious Movements, specifies that episcopi vagantes are now "those independent bishops who collect several different lines of transmission of apostolic succession, and who will happily (and sometimes for a fee) consecrate anyone who requests it".
The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church mentions as the main lines of succession deriving from episcopi vagantes in the 20th century those founded by Arnold Mathew, Joseph René Vilatte and Leon Chechemian.
[1] According to Buchanan, "the real rise of the problem" happened in the 19th century, in the "wake of the Anglo-Catholic movement", "through mischievous activities of a tiny number of independently acting bishops".
[4] Paul Halsall, on the Internet History Sourcebooks Project, did not list a single church edifice of independent bishops, in a 1996–1998 New York City building architecture survey of religious communities, which maintain bishops claiming apostolic succession and claim cathedral status but noted there "are now literally hundreds of these 'episcopi vagantes', of lesser or greater spiritual probity.
[5] David V. Barrett wrote, in A Brief Guide to Secret Religions, that "one hallmark of such bishops is that they often collect as many lineages as they can to strengthen their Episcopal legitimacy—at least in their own eyes", and adds that their groups have more clergy than members.
[6]: 56 Buchanan writes that based the criteria of having "a true see" or having "a real church life to oversee", the bishops of most forms of the Continuing Anglican movement are not necessarily classified as vagantes, but "are always in danger of becoming such".
[11] Vlassios Pheidas, on an official Church of Greece site, uses the canonical language of the Eastern Orthodox tradition, to describe the conditions in ecclesial praxis when sacraments, including Holy Orders, are real, valid, and efficacious.
Thus, the [Eastern] Orthodox Church, while accepting the canonical possibility of recognising the existence (υποστατόν) of sacraments performed outside herself, it questions their validity (έγκυρον) and certainly rejects their efficacy (ενεργόν).
However, although strict adherence to law supersedes economy by their Cyprian understanding, some mainstream Eastern Orthodox bodies recognize Roman Catholic orders and don't conditionally ordain clergy as each autocephalous church determines the validity of another's ordination.
[4]: 335 Stephen Edmonds, in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, wrote that in 1910 Mathew's wife separated from him; that same year, he declared himself and his church seceded from the Union of Utrecht.
[18] He later sued The Times for libel based on the words "pseudo-bishop" used to describe him in the newspaper's translation from the Latin text "pseudo-episcopus", and, lost his case in 1913.
[17] Henry R.T. Brandreth wrote, in Episcopi Vagantes and the Anglican Church, "[o]ne of the most regrettable features of Mathew's episcopate was the founding of the Order of Corporate Reunion (OCR) in 1908.