ANGLICANS entering the Catholic Church through the special Ordinariate
established for them must do so with genuine acceptance of the Church’s
teachings or not at all, one of its key figures said at a historic
gathering last week.
Traditional Anglican Communion Bishop Harry Entwistle, who will host a
Festival for the Anglican Ordinariate in Australia at Como parish on 26
February, told the gathering in Coomera on Queensland’s Gold Coast that
unity can only exist when there is unity of faith.
With a relic of Thomas Beckett to his left, Bishop Entwistle quoted TS
Eliot’s play Murder in the Cathedral, where he gave the martyred
Archbishop of Canterbury the line: “Above all things this is the
greatest treason, to do the right thing for the wrong reason.”
This is
critical to Anglicans seeking unity with Rome, Bishop Entwistle said
during his homily at an Anglican Mass for unity on 3 February at the
Festival that drew 62 people.
“Those entering the Ordinariate must be
quite clear that we wish to embrace the Catholic faith and not just
enter into this Ordinariate because there’s no other option. So we must
do it for the right reason, otherwise it’s not real,” he said.
Thomas Becket was martyred at the altar of his own Canterbury Cathedral during a service by King Henry II’s knights and buried in a vault in the church, which was wrecked during the Protestant Reformation.
The relic of his hand, on the altar at the Anglican Festival in Coomera, has been authenticated.
The 1-3 February Festival was historic as it was the first time Roman Catholics, Anglicans and Anglicans who have been received into the Catholic Church have gathered in the one place.
The Queensland Festival also saw two Catholic Bishops celebrating Mass in an Anglican Church – a rare event as it’s often traditional Anglicans who have had to celebrate their Mass in Catholic churches as they have been ostracised from their own Church.
The Mass also included the customary blessing of the candles for Candlemas, otherwise known as the Presentation of the Lord.
Melbourne Auxiliary Bishop Peter Elliott, a former Anglican and delegate for the Holy See for the Australian Ordinariate, celebrated Mass of the Presentation of the Lord with another ex-Anglican Bishop Geoffrey Jarrett of Lismore and Fr John Fleming, a former Anglican priest who was instrumental in advising the traditional Anglicans canonically on how to approach the Holy See for unity.
Catholic and Anglican priests also celebrated the anniversaries of their ordinations on Candlemas.
In his homily at the Queensland Festival, Bishop Entwistle also quoted TS Eliot’s poem Little Gidding, where the writer Bishop Entwislte described as a US “Anglican of Catholic ilk,” said: “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
This is apt for Anglicans seeking union with Rome, the Bishop said, as “we came from the western Catholic Church where we started, we’ve been up and down, in rough patches; we’re all now where we are starting from, so that we all know it and come to love it”.
Over 50 people have already confirmed their attendance at the 26 February Festival at Holy Family parish in Como, which promises to reveal much about the personal struggles of Anglicans leaving the Church of their forefathers and becoming Catholics.
It will also reveal what attraction the new Ordinariate has for ‘cradle Catholics’ and Anglicans who are struggling to reconcile their own beliefs with the increasing liberalisation of the mainstream Anglican Church.
On 9 November 2009, the Vatican published Pope Benedict’s apostolic constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus (“Groups of Anglicans”) along with specific norms governing the establishment and governance of “personal ordinariates,” structures similar to dioceses, for former Anglicans who become Catholic. Bishop Elliott said that at the Coomera Festival, “difficult questions were raised frankly”, but added that he was moved when people gave testimonies of their journeys towards the Ordinariate.
“We all came to understand the urgent pastoral need for this unique community in full communion with the Successor of St Peter,” he said.
The Bishops met with traditional Anglicans after the Festival and
discussed key issues to be sorted out.
Top on the list was property –
“how the TAC and those Anglicans are going to be able to move into the
Ordinariate without losing everything they have”, as Bishop Entwistle
said.
Even Bishop Entwistle’s Sts Ninian and Chad parish church in Maylands, a
former Catholic East Maylands Mission that the WA Synod of TAC
purchased, cannot simply become a Catholic parish without sorting out
legal technicalities as the TAC is an incorporated body with properties
and trusts.
TAC Bishop Tolowa Nona of the Church of the Torres Strait
and his own priests and laity also attended the Coomera Festival, which
was hosted by TAC Primate Archbishop John Hepworth of Adelaide, chair of
St Stephen’s College where it was held.
While Australian Catholic and
traditional Anglican prelates are still aiming for Pentecost as the date
when the local Ordinariate will be established, “until the CDF (the
Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) announces it, we
can never be certain”, Bishop Entwistle said.
Numbers are also hard to predict until the Ordinariate is established, he said.
Other festivals are being planned for Melbourne, Sydney and
Adelaide to inform people as plans for an Australian Ordinariate take
shape.
Anyone interested in the 26 February Festival can register by calling 08 9328 4473 or forward a form and fee to Ordinariate Festival, PO Box 457, North Perth WA 6906.