With regard to Anglicanorum coetibus, the elephant-in-the-room ... my real reason for wanting unity with the Holy See ... now, this is totally confidential; just within these four walls ... is that I have long been dead envious of Proper Churches (like that one opposite the Italian restaurant in Kensington, for example) which are full of all those minute but marvellously devout Philippino ladies in mantillas running round and beaming up at one one.
After my more than two years here, S Thomas's was visited this morning by my first Philippino lady. As she put it, "It is just the same!" (I didn't ask her "Same as what?")
Now, if she were to multiply into a couple of dozen of the same (I'm not a greedy man), would I still need coetus of Anglicani? Wouldn't a Philippino Patrimony be perfectly adequate?
Yes, they are adorable; and typically good semstresses too.
ReplyDeleteFather
ReplyDeleteIf your 'desire for comunion' with Rome did not extend beyond the desire to be surrounded by Phillipino ladies, then I would say that you had better stay where you are (no reflection on where you are is implied in that statement.)
Having studied your blog for some time however, and having prayed for you, I feel that perhaps there may just be a little more to your yearnings - if 'yearnings' they are.
You remain an enigma surrounded by a mystery - which is no doubt your intention.
and sometimes I am just frivolous.
ReplyDelete"The willow which bends to the tempest, often escapes better than the oak which resists it; and so in great calamities, it sometimes happens that light and frivolous spirits recover their elasticity and presence of mind sooner than those of a loftier character." (Albert Schweitzer)
ReplyDeleteAs William Paulet (ca. 1475-1572), Marquess of Wonchester and Lord Treasurer, a man of religiously conservative sentiments, supposedly once replied when asked how he could have prospered during every regime from the early 1520s onwards, "Ortus sum e salice, non ex quercu."
ReplyDeleteAnd did she come to what she thought was Holy Communion?
ReplyDeleteI really wanted to visit your Church when I was in Oxford last September. Unfortunately, adjusting to the cold weather was too much for me. I'm Filipino.
ReplyDeletePhilippino Neri ?
ReplyDeleteFIlipino, not PHIlippino. :)
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