No sooner than I done the previous post when the Royal Mail (Don't make jokes about the Duke of Edinburgh) delivered Litterae ad Clerum on the lovely pink paper upon which the Bishop of Oxford, John Pritchard, communicates with us.
He has an instinctive talent for the sneering put-down. But I won't elaborate upon that in case I get flooded with comments about people who live in glasshouses. What riled me most was : "I wonder what [Anglicanorum coetibus] really says about Rome's seriousness over ecumenical dialogues and whether the ARCIC programme has a significant future".
Why can't these people just robustly say "We decided to terminate the last phase of the Ecumenical Movement - the phase in which organic union was the aim - because there are very important questions on which we are right and Rome, quite simply, is wrong. This was an impasse round which there is no way until Rome changes her mind".
But no; the b*****s have an insatiable hunger for the Moral High Ground. Since the 1970s, Roman Pontiffs and their emissaries have been begging the Anglican establishment not to place new and very grave obstacles in the way of convergence; but, time and time again, they have been categorically ignored.
And yet they have the bare-faced impudence to enquire whether Rome is "serious" about dialogue. "Dialogue" appears to mean "We do whatever we like whatever the difficulties it creates for you, but we expect you to carry on as if nothing has happened. If you decline to fall in with this agenda, we shovel condescending insults down on you from our own righteous eminence".
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This definition of "dialogue" seems to me to be a pretty accurate description of Rome's attitude towards others!
They've messed up their own denomination and broken down ecumenical bridges. Rather than accept responsibility for their self-destructive behaviour, they've decided to scape-goat the Holy Father.
Pink is for precious.
My O my ain't he a sweetie-pie!
Where I come from, boys like that are called sissies. What's next? Yellow? Mauve? Lavender?
And I wonder what the attempted ordination of women really says about Canterbury's seriousness over ecumenical dialogues and whether the ARCIC programme has a significant future.
Sadly too many Anglicans (especially in the Church of England - some of the 'Catholics') only ever wanted from ARCIC a recognition of our Orders and Sacraments without any true Unity.
It was Napoleon seeking membership of the Royal Houses of Europe but remaining the self-crowned head of revolution.
I suppose to give them their due that these liberals believe the fantasy shared by many like-minded Catholics - that eventually Rome will catch up and ordain women, no longer claim all manner of curious practices to be sins, etc. In this view, Rome is simply behind the times, and convergence to the Omega Point is ineluctable.
The ARCIC discussions had as theitr professed end-point full corporate communion and that the tCatholic Church and the Anglican Communion would begin discussions by going back to the ancient common tradition and moving forward from there to tackle newer areas of disagreeement since the Reformation. That the American and Canadian, and New Zealnd Anglicans decide to break that disagreement unilateraly so soon after it was made (cf Lambeth Conference 1968)is highly suggestive of hypocrisy on the Anglican side from the beginning.
There is much more about this silly little bishop on
http://sbarnabas.com/blog/
(the Bishop of Oxford and his detestable enormities!)
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