Traditional Anglican Communion in Britain accepts Papal offer.
The Traditional Anglican Communion’s province in Great Britain has become the first to accept Pope Benedict XVI’s Apostolic Constitution for Anglicans.
All its members voted unanimously to come into communion with Rome under the terms of the new provision, which allows them to retain their Anglican patrimony. The vote included postal votes from those who could not be present.
The resolutions, passed at the Synod on Thursday 29th October, in the presence of the Primate of the Traditional Anglican Communion, Archbishop Hepworth of Australia, read:
“That this Assembly, representing the Traditional Anglican Communion in Great Britain, offers its joyful thanks to Pope Benedict XVI for his forthcoming Apostolic Constitution allowing the corporate reunion of Anglicans with the Holy See, and requests the Primate and College of Bishops of the Traditional Anglican Communion to take the steps necessary to implement this Constitution.”
A statement from Bishop David Moyer of the Traditional Anglican Communion reads:
“The well-attended Assembly was a grace-filled gathering where all in attendance became aware of the movement of the Holy Spirit. The bishops, priests, ordinands, and lay representatives were brought to a place of “being in full accord and of one mind,” as St. Paul prayed for the Church in Philippi.
“The questions and concerns that were expressed in regard to what had been read and heard about the forthcoming Apostolic Constitution were addressed by Archbishop John Hepworth, Bishop Mercer and myself.
“The Resolutions unanimously passed by the Assembly were carefully written and clearly reflect the British TAC’s corporate desire and intention. All present realized that the requirement for the days ahead is patience, charity, and openness to the Holy Spirit.”
Significantly, this vote took place in the birthplace of the Anglican Communion, and its members voted in favor despite the Apostolic Constitution having not yet been published.
The Synod was held at Saint Catherine’s Priory, a restored Monastic House destroyed by Henry VIII. The Traditional Anglican Communion has spent over four million pounds restoring the Priory as a national cathedral, and the world-heritage rated monastic ruins are visible through plate glass sections of the floor in the restored church. Other buildings on the site that have been restored include the monastic refectory that serves as a hell and a youth training facility. Archbishop Hepworth ordained a deacon there recently – the first ordination on the site since the Reformation.
Cardinal defends Pope’s offer to Anglicans
By Anna Arco and Andrew M Brown 6 November 2009
Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor has been appointed to posts in two key Vatican departments (Mazur/CCN)
CARDINAL Cormac Murphy-O'Connor has strongly defended Pope Benedict XVI's decision to extend a hand to Anglicans wishing to enter communion with Rome but maintain their identity.
He was speaking days after being appointed to two curial bodies, the Congregation for Bishops and the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples.
Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor, the former Archbishop of Westminster and a leading figure in Anglican-Catholic dialogue, said the papal decree announced last month was a generous response.
He told The Catholic Herald: "I think the [Apostolic Constitution] should be judged quite simply as what it is - a generous response by the Holy Father to these groups of Anglicans who've been knocking at the door, particularly of the Holy Office, over these past years."
Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor said that the Pope's intention was not to "poach" Anglicans. He said: "If these priests and lay people really want to become Catholics, then let's have them, particularly if they've got a lot of lay people with them. Something like this is obviously going to be easier than receiving them one by one."
He also rejected the criticism that Anglicans taking advantage of the provision were doing so because they were against the ordination of women bishops, and insisted instead that they were seeking communion with Rome.
Vatican officials last month announced an Apostolic Constitution, or papal decree, which would enable Anglicans to become Catholics without losing their cultural and spiritual identity by applying to the Holy See for a Personal Ordinariate, a canonical structure similar to a military diocese.
Speaking for the first time in public about the decree last week, Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor gave an ecumenical lecture at Worth Abbey, where he stressed that Pope Benedict's response was not a "reflection or comment on the Anglican Communion as a whole or of our ongoing ecumenical relationship with them".
The cardinal explained that the new structure proposed in the Apostolic Constitution had been put forward in the 1990s after the Church of England General Synod decided that it was possible to ordain women to the priesthood.
At the time, Cardinal Basil Hume, Bishop Alan Clark of East Anglia, then Bishop Vincent Nichols and Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor were responsible for the talks with Forward in Faith. Pope Benedict, who was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger at the time, was also involved in the talks.
In his speech Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor said that "for the Anglicans who wished to come into full communion with the Church a provision such as the Personal Ordinariates might have been very helpful at the time".
But he said the structure was rejected for two reasons.
He said: "The first is that in 1993-94 we bishops were dealing solely with clergy of the Church of England, and any such response as is now given by the Holy See would naturally have had to be offered to the whole of the Provinces of the Anglican Communion. It did not seem within our remit to engage in such a response.
"The other reason, however, was even more important. If the Holy See had offered such Personal Ordinariates then, and in particular here in England, it might well have been seen as an un-ecumenical approach by the Holy See, as if wanting to put out the net as far as one could."
But he said that the establishment of Ordinariates was not unecumenical today.
During his talk the cardinal also stressed that ecumenical dialogue was not "dead in the water".
After more than 40 years of official Anglican-Catholic dialogue, he said, "some of the classic disputes at the root of our painful divisions have today been basically resolved through a new consensus of fundamental doctrine".
Meanwhile the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Fatih denied rumours that the Apostolic Constitution regarding the Anglican provision has been delayed because of a heated debate over priestly celibacy.
Cardinal William Levada denied reports by Andrea Tornielli, a leading Vatican observer, that the document was delayed because Curial officials were still debating whether a personal ordinariate could put forward married seminarians for ordination -_a move which some observers believe could loosen the western Church's celibacy rules.
He said: "Had I been asked I would happily have clarified any doubt about my remarks at the press conference. There is no substance to such speculation. No one at the Vatican has mentioned any such issue to me. The delay is purely technical in the sense of ensuring consistency in canonical language and references."
According to Cardinal Levada, the rules for celibacy within the Anglican provision were outlined in draft versions of the Apostolic Constitution prepared before the announcement in October. Married men in Anglican orders could be ordained as priests but only celibate men would be put forward for the priesthood within an ordinariate as a rule.
But the cardinal did not rule out the admission of married men on a case-by-case basis.
He said: "This article is to be understood as consistent with the current practice of the Church, in which married former Anglican ministers may be admitted to priestly ministry in the Church on a case-by-case basis."
Source: Catholic Herald.
