Ordinariate Watch: The Ordinariate & Anglican Patrimony (Part 1)

There is a little group of former Anglicans who worship in the Church of Our Lady Queen of Peace and Blessed Margaret Pole. As with all such Groups, and there are now dozens up and down the country, there is a constant struggle to maintain our identity, and yet be clearly a true part of the Catholic Church. When the Holy Father, only two years since, produced “Anglicanorum Coetibus”, and startled the ecumenical world, there were two things the documents stressed.

One was that this was for GROUPS of Anglicans; that is what Anglicanorum Coetibus means. Some of us were meeting this week at Allen Hall, as part of our ongoing formation as Catholic priests. We spoke about the different situations from which we came; and found that no two were exactly similar. At one extreme was a strong Group in Kent, which represented almost the entire congregation of a local Anglican church. They and their Vicar had sought admission to the Church in one body, and the Catholic diocese had offered them the use of a small building a few miles out of town which had been no more than a Mass Centre for a larger town church. This group has become so established, and has built up such good relations with the Catholics they were joining, that it is likely the former Anglican Vicar will become the Parish Priest of a new parish based on that little mission building.

At the other end of the spectrum was a priest who had joined the Catholic Church with only a handful of parishioners. Another local Vicar had brought more of his people with him, so all the former Anglicans were put into one Group, and the priest with the handful was left without any. He was asked to go to a Catholic church a few miles away to minister to the existing congregation. To his delight, though, he has begun to find there are local ex-Anglicans worshipping with him. They had been travelling many miles to an Ordinariate Group – though only eight or ten at present, they look forward to building their numbers and so gaining some group identity. To read more, click here.