Vatican Rag 2
If you want a good reflection on all this, I suggest you look at Bishop Nick Baines blog nick.baines@wordpress.com
However a bit of me wants to express less peacable sentiments. I think a bit of ’speaking the truth in love’ might be appropriate….
1:+Rowan has been stitched up like a kipper over this. To only be given a couple of weeks notice and to be presented with a fait accompli is not the generous act of a sister church but rather a piece of opportunistic poaching. The English Catholic fantasy of bringing us all back to Rome and getting all our lovely cathedrals back is just that, a fantasy, but it is one that has damaged ecumenical relations for too long. It is also insufferably smug!
2:Already some people are beginning to speculate about financial provision for those who go, and or sharing/giving churches. Well I hope we play hardball over this. If people want to become RCs, denying their ordination and validity of their orders, well that is up to them, but I see no reason for the Church of England to pay a penny. Again on sharing buildings; if it is in our interest to be rid of some buildings that are unsuitable for mission well there might be a case, otherwise those who go can make their own arrangements and pay for it. Incidentally how are they going to pay pensions and stipends for married clergy?
3: How are progressive Catholics going to react?
4: The idea that the Anglican communion’s debates on sexuality contributes to the need for a safe haven for FiF clergy in Rome takes the biscuit, considering the gay sub culture in FiF.
5: If priests convert to Rome then they must accept the papal claims. If they accept such claims why did they not go long before.
I could go on! What it comes down to is the death, and not before time, of the anglo-papalist strain in the CofE. This movement had some great priests but contained within it the seeds of its own destruction in terms of its internal contradictions. How could you follow the teaching and use the liturgy of another church which denied the validity of your orders. Such clergy now face a choice whether to go where they should have been for years or to stay. Put up or shut up, I feel!
There was always another strain in the Tractarian movement, exemplified by figures like Pusey and Keble, which stressed our continuity in the Church of England with the early church, and looked to it for inspiration and not to 19th century Rome. They emphasised Anglican thinkers like Hooker(who I cannot resist mentioning a the drop of a hat!), Andrewes, Laud and the Caroline divnes. It is this heritage which we sorely need to rediscover as many of us who are fully supportive of women’s ministry seek to give a future shape to Catholic Anglicanism. In many ways this is an opportunity for us.
