Dinner last night at Pusey House, which is celebrating its 125th Birthday. Most of the great and the good of the Catholic Movement were there, including John Broadhurst, Bishop of Fulham who put the Movement together again after the disasters of the mid1990s, and Dr Geoffrey Kirk, the unremittingly hard-working Secretary of Forward in Faith whose erudition, tempered by a brilliantly satiric wit, has for so long enliverned our meetings and our journal New Directions.
And how lovely to have there the gentle and friendly figure of our best friend, Fr Aidan Nichols. I can't think of anyone who has done more for us than he has. He has been so generous - in terms of personal relationships; through his book The Panther and the Hind in which he sketched his picture of Orthodox Anglicanism Reunited to the Holy See: a dream which, if the Apostolic Constitution is allowed to do its work, will soon be more than a dream. I remember the first time I met him; when I read a paper on a subject that I knew very little about in great fear and trembling as to what such a formidable intellect might say about it. I need not have worried.
And there were the young together with the once-young who served as Head Sacristans or Directors of Music at PH. Very many of those present were, as you might suspect, already in Full Communion with the Holy See. It was good to be able to gossip about the progress within the RCC of the EF Mass. It is a subject on which the young seem very sound.
I wonder what future historians might say about the role of Pusey House in the restoration of the English RCC to orthopraxy.
31 October 2009
30 October 2009
Full communion?
My previous post on the Te igitur leaves a big question: how does its conclusion fit in with a situation in which Christendom is divided? Does it mean that only those in full canonical communion with the See of Rome should use the Canon Romanus?
I think this does not necessarily follow. The solution, I feel, may be offered by the CDF document Communionis notio of 1993 (para 14). A valid Mass offered in a community which lacks full communion with the See of Peter, by its very nature as a Eucharist of the Whole Church, "objectively calls for" the "universal communion with Peter". I feel that therefore those in this sort of anomalous situation do appropriately name the Successsor of Peter since their Mass "objectively" calls for full communion. And this is even truer, a fortiori , when the celebrant subjectively longs for such full communion and has no desire to adhere to any schism.
This is a good opportunity to repeat that Communionis notio, like its successor Dominus Iesus, was a document unfairly attacked by bigots as "unecumenical". Both are quite the opposite. They provide an impetus for properly based ecumenism by their teaching that a Particular Church, which has a Bishop and valid sacraments, is a true Particular Church and ipso facto a local manifestation of the Church Catholic even if it is not in full canonical communion with the See of Rome. Disunity will wound it because it lacks the Ministry of Peter which is organically internal to a properly constituted Church but this does not deprive it of its status as a true particular church. The CDF went on to balance this by saying that the Roman Communion is also itself wounded by the disunity because it is deprived to a degree of universality.
I have not finished with this topic. I'll return to it in two or three days.
I think this does not necessarily follow. The solution, I feel, may be offered by the CDF document Communionis notio of 1993 (para 14). A valid Mass offered in a community which lacks full communion with the See of Peter, by its very nature as a Eucharist of the Whole Church, "objectively calls for" the "universal communion with Peter". I feel that therefore those in this sort of anomalous situation do appropriately name the Successsor of Peter since their Mass "objectively" calls for full communion. And this is even truer, a fortiori , when the celebrant subjectively longs for such full communion and has no desire to adhere to any schism.
This is a good opportunity to repeat that Communionis notio, like its successor Dominus Iesus, was a document unfairly attacked by bigots as "unecumenical". Both are quite the opposite. They provide an impetus for properly based ecumenism by their teaching that a Particular Church, which has a Bishop and valid sacraments, is a true Particular Church and ipso facto a local manifestation of the Church Catholic even if it is not in full canonical communion with the See of Rome. Disunity will wound it because it lacks the Ministry of Peter which is organically internal to a properly constituted Church but this does not deprive it of its status as a true particular church. The CDF went on to balance this by saying that the Roman Communion is also itself wounded by the disunity because it is deprived to a degree of universality.
I have not finished with this topic. I'll return to it in two or three days.
29 October 2009
WONDERFUL!
If you haven't read Dr Dawkins' full response in the Washington Post, you must. It is the most wonderful, rich, beautifully expressed, totally revealing piece of sublime Barminess I have ever seen. Our own local Anglican hero, the Barmy Bishop of Bux, is a helpless third-former compared with Dawkins. Long may God preserve him. Don't ever think of "replying" to his every point. That would be infantile. Just lie back and enjoy it for the masterpiece it is. As far as this Blog is concerned, Dawkins Rules, OK. What this Blog calls for is the preservation of Dawkins, stuffed and mounted, in the Pitt-Rivers Museum here in Oxford, his own University. If we aren't entitled to have him on permanent display, who is? If he is not available for these purposes, perhaps the staff could do a full-sized mock-up of him, like their very convincing mock-up of the Dodo, so that future generations, our grandchildren and great grandchildren (or great nephews and great great nephews, if your name is Finnegan) can know what he looked like; perhaps even feel him; the Pitt-Rivers is a delightfully interactive museum, inviting both children and adults to stroke and grope its stuffed marvels. Perhaps he could be made to go through a series of mechanised movements, as in the mock-up they have there of the baby dinosaurs emerging from their eggs.
Dawkins represents all that is most traditionally and quintessentially English. Other cultures have their atheists, but we are the only race, the only culture (if American readers try to horn in on my proud boast by claiming that they do to, I shall delete the comments) that has Protestant atheists. In 1928, during the Prayer Book Revision Crisis, two Communist MPs, proud Marxists, consistently voted against the Proposed Book. When asked why it was a matter of such concern to atheists whether or not Anglican priests had the Blessed Sacrament reserved upon their Altars, the two replied that they were of course Protestant atheists. (Stuart specialists will recall also the delightful vignette of Dear Nell leaning out of her carriage and crying to the rioting mob "Peace, Good People: I am the Protestant Whore".) Because Protestantism is the ultimate, the fall-back superstition of the English; what really lies at the pulsating heart of our national identity. Atheism, like Theism for that matter, is only superficial; something that a Dawkins only wears to go to Church or for Encaenia; the tie you put on when your girl-friend invites you home to meet Daddy. Deep down, we English couldn't care less whether God exists or not. That's just an arid question for philosophers and intellectuals. Dawkins himself thinks that "the Anglican Church", although it believes in God, is actually rather a nice organisation with "Christ-like compassion" and with a "saintly" Archbishop. No; what we English really hate - and hate with every fibre of our being - is CATHOLICS.
[A footnote in the field of textual criticism, which I am proud to have learned at the feet of the great George Kilpatrick, Dean Ireland Professor in this University: in the superb passage " that disgusting institution, the Roman Catholic Church, is dragging its flowing skirts in the dirt and touting for business like a common pimp", "pimp" is clearly a scribal corruption because pimps, as every feminist knows, are exploitative males, and males do not wear flowing skirts [we clergy do, but as we mince along in our homophobic yet pederastic quest of Altar Boys we always make sure that our soutanes never trail in the mud]. And the traditional topoi of the Scarlet Woman and the Whore of Babylon are clearly echoed here. Clearly one should emend to either "tart" or "whore". Since the passage is faintly archaic in its rhetoric and imagery, I prefer to conjecture "whore". At the very least, critical texts should obelise "pimp".]
Dawkins represents all that is most traditionally and quintessentially English. Other cultures have their atheists, but we are the only race, the only culture (if American readers try to horn in on my proud boast by claiming that they do to, I shall delete the comments) that has Protestant atheists. In 1928, during the Prayer Book Revision Crisis, two Communist MPs, proud Marxists, consistently voted against the Proposed Book. When asked why it was a matter of such concern to atheists whether or not Anglican priests had the Blessed Sacrament reserved upon their Altars, the two replied that they were of course Protestant atheists. (Stuart specialists will recall also the delightful vignette of Dear Nell leaning out of her carriage and crying to the rioting mob "Peace, Good People: I am the Protestant Whore".) Because Protestantism is the ultimate, the fall-back superstition of the English; what really lies at the pulsating heart of our national identity. Atheism, like Theism for that matter, is only superficial; something that a Dawkins only wears to go to Church or for Encaenia; the tie you put on when your girl-friend invites you home to meet Daddy. Deep down, we English couldn't care less whether God exists or not. That's just an arid question for philosophers and intellectuals. Dawkins himself thinks that "the Anglican Church", although it believes in God, is actually rather a nice organisation with "Christ-like compassion" and with a "saintly" Archbishop. No; what we English really hate - and hate with every fibre of our being - is CATHOLICS.
[A footnote in the field of textual criticism, which I am proud to have learned at the feet of the great George Kilpatrick, Dean Ireland Professor in this University: in the superb passage " that disgusting institution, the Roman Catholic Church, is dragging its flowing skirts in the dirt and touting for business like a common pimp", "pimp" is clearly a scribal corruption because pimps, as every feminist knows, are exploitative males, and males do not wear flowing skirts [we clergy do, but as we mince along in our homophobic yet pederastic quest of Altar Boys we always make sure that our soutanes never trail in the mud]. And the traditional topoi of the Scarlet Woman and the Whore of Babylon are clearly echoed here. Clearly one should emend to either "tart" or "whore". Since the passage is faintly archaic in its rhetoric and imagery, I prefer to conjecture "whore". At the very least, critical texts should obelise "pimp".]
28 October 2009
Anglican Clergy
One friendly RC blogger has suggested that the acceptance of Anglican clergy into RC presbyteral ministry might not be unconditional. I agree, but feel strongly that the checking be left to the Ordinariates and not be in the hands of English RC bishops. For reasons that I think are obvious; mainly, that an Anglican is best placed to know whether the training at a particular place at a particular time was in fact adequate.
It is certainly true that those "NSMs" 'trained' on correspondence courses run by the mainstream C of E will need some real training. I once asked a priest, NSM, in a London Anglo-Catholic shrine church, to hear my confession; it became clear as we went along that not only had he had no training himself in this ministry, but had clearly never himself made a Confession. At the end, I had to get up and find a BCP and show him the Formula Absolutionis in the Visitatio Infirmorum and tell him to say it.
And our constituency is not entirely without clergy who are remarried divorcees or have married divorcees, who would clearly need to be interviewed by a canon lawyer. And there are clergy who belong to proscribed organisations, like our daft old friends the 'Freemasons'. Etc., I fear. Quite so. But this must not be made an excuse for ponderous processes of 'discernment' really designed to discourage all but the most persistent. The model should be the behaviour of a French bishop in the 1990s, who, so I heard, phoned up Cardinal Ratzinger to find out if he could employ a couple of Anglicans whom he knew (they had a holiday cottage in his diocese and were fluent in French). He was told, on the phone, to go ahead (the faculties would follow by post). On Shrove Tuesday the two said Mass for the last time as Anglicans; on Ash Wednesday were received into full communion; after Easter ordained deacons sub conditione; at Pentecost ordained priests sub conditione. I don't think that quite matches the speed in Archdeacon Manning's case, but it's better than most people have had to put up with who have fallen into the hands of the English RC hierarchy. Another practical point: clergy who 'poped' years ago and are still sitting around being 'discerned' should have access to the new arrangements. They've suffered enough.
On a happier note, may I say that I hope there will be mechanisms for clergy to be loaned. Particularly if a number of retired but active clergy take the option, they might outnumber the available congregations. Perhaps they might be loaned to local RC dioceses, if it is possible to find room to squeeze them into Mass rotas without depriving current RC clergy of their cherished privilege of Quinquination. Or we could be of use to bodies like FSSP. Or, if SSPX accepts its own Roman Offer, to them. Some Anglican clergy are Byzantinophiles, who might relish the privilege of ministering to Melkites or Ukrainians.
We Anglicans are very versatile.
It is certainly true that those "NSMs" 'trained' on correspondence courses run by the mainstream C of E will need some real training. I once asked a priest, NSM, in a London Anglo-Catholic shrine church, to hear my confession; it became clear as we went along that not only had he had no training himself in this ministry, but had clearly never himself made a Confession. At the end, I had to get up and find a BCP and show him the Formula Absolutionis in the Visitatio Infirmorum and tell him to say it.
And our constituency is not entirely without clergy who are remarried divorcees or have married divorcees, who would clearly need to be interviewed by a canon lawyer. And there are clergy who belong to proscribed organisations, like our daft old friends the 'Freemasons'. Etc., I fear. Quite so. But this must not be made an excuse for ponderous processes of 'discernment' really designed to discourage all but the most persistent. The model should be the behaviour of a French bishop in the 1990s, who, so I heard, phoned up Cardinal Ratzinger to find out if he could employ a couple of Anglicans whom he knew (they had a holiday cottage in his diocese and were fluent in French). He was told, on the phone, to go ahead (the faculties would follow by post). On Shrove Tuesday the two said Mass for the last time as Anglicans; on Ash Wednesday were received into full communion; after Easter ordained deacons sub conditione; at Pentecost ordained priests sub conditione. I don't think that quite matches the speed in Archdeacon Manning's case, but it's better than most people have had to put up with who have fallen into the hands of the English RC hierarchy. Another practical point: clergy who 'poped' years ago and are still sitting around being 'discerned' should have access to the new arrangements. They've suffered enough.
On a happier note, may I say that I hope there will be mechanisms for clergy to be loaned. Particularly if a number of retired but active clergy take the option, they might outnumber the available congregations. Perhaps they might be loaned to local RC dioceses, if it is possible to find room to squeeze them into Mass rotas without depriving current RC clergy of their cherished privilege of Quinquination. Or we could be of use to bodies like FSSP. Or, if SSPX accepts its own Roman Offer, to them. Some Anglican clergy are Byzantinophiles, who might relish the privilege of ministering to Melkites or Ukrainians.
We Anglicans are very versatile.
26 October 2009
Pardon my language
I nipped into Church House Bookshop to look at Pepinsta's Editorial in the Tablet (the restoration of Full Communion won't mean we are expected to buy the b****y thing, will it? I think we need reassurance on this from the highest levels). She says that what we have to gain from Unity is finding out about 'Sacramentality'.
Di Immortales! Viden qua ignorantia mugiat vacca? Quos putat scelesta nos esse? Quakers? Vesanum c****m.
****** ********* ******* **********
Di Immortales! Viden qua ignorantia mugiat vacca? Quos putat scelesta nos esse? Quakers? Vesanum c****m.
****** ********* ******* **********
25 October 2009
Apostolic Constitution
A splendid meeting in Westminster, with hundreds of laity and priests and bishops and seminarians.
How remarkable was the enthusiasm - especially among the younger priests and seminarians - for the Holy Father's generous initiative.
The laity shared this sense of a wonderful historical moment, but had their own concerns about property; about whether the C of E would let it follow the Ordinariates.
I printed in New Directions quite recently a sermon which, knowing that something like the Constitution was imminent, I preached at our Patronal Festival at S Thomas's in July; in which I pointed out that our medieval churches were not built by Protestants or Liberals; and neither were the new slum churches built by the great Anglo-Catholic clergy of the Victorian period. The C of E, which is a dab hand at declaring churches redundant, has no need to be mean to us.
But there is a theological point here, and I think the Laity were entirely right in their concerns.
Churches, in Catholic Tradition, are massive and significant Sacramentals. They were consecrated in lengthy rites with powerful symbols; the tracing of alphabets on the floor; the anointing of the Consecration Crosses inside and out; the consecration of Altars and the sealing within them of the relics. I was reminded of this recently as I read the Opera of Benedict XIV; a King - John - of Portugal had had an entire and very grand prefabricated Chapel made in Rome (yes: the one which featured so prominently in the recent V & A Baroque exhibition). The king had asked the Pope himself to consecrate it before it was transported to Lisbon. And he did. And he wrote to the King to tell him that he had done so; and reminded his Lusitanian Majesty that the rites of Consecration are so lengthy and so tiring that the Pontificale permits a second person to take over towards the end and actually sing the Mass. But, says this admirable Pontiff, "I did it all myself".
Our churches are not, as one enthusiastic young priest seemed to imply, fairly insignificant pieces of property. They embody the love and the history and the memory of the communities which built and sustained them.
Why should the Liberals have them?
So that they can sell them to property developers?
How remarkable was the enthusiasm - especially among the younger priests and seminarians - for the Holy Father's generous initiative.
The laity shared this sense of a wonderful historical moment, but had their own concerns about property; about whether the C of E would let it follow the Ordinariates.
I printed in New Directions quite recently a sermon which, knowing that something like the Constitution was imminent, I preached at our Patronal Festival at S Thomas's in July; in which I pointed out that our medieval churches were not built by Protestants or Liberals; and neither were the new slum churches built by the great Anglo-Catholic clergy of the Victorian period. The C of E, which is a dab hand at declaring churches redundant, has no need to be mean to us.
But there is a theological point here, and I think the Laity were entirely right in their concerns.
Churches, in Catholic Tradition, are massive and significant Sacramentals. They were consecrated in lengthy rites with powerful symbols; the tracing of alphabets on the floor; the anointing of the Consecration Crosses inside and out; the consecration of Altars and the sealing within them of the relics. I was reminded of this recently as I read the Opera of Benedict XIV; a King - John - of Portugal had had an entire and very grand prefabricated Chapel made in Rome (yes: the one which featured so prominently in the recent V & A Baroque exhibition). The king had asked the Pope himself to consecrate it before it was transported to Lisbon. And he did. And he wrote to the King to tell him that he had done so; and reminded his Lusitanian Majesty that the rites of Consecration are so lengthy and so tiring that the Pontificale permits a second person to take over towards the end and actually sing the Mass. But, says this admirable Pontiff, "I did it all myself".
Our churches are not, as one enthusiastic young priest seemed to imply, fairly insignificant pieces of property. They embody the love and the history and the memory of the communities which built and sustained them.
Why should the Liberals have them?
So that they can sell them to property developers?
23 October 2009
Versus Orientem
A bit of a rant in the admirable NLM. But I wonder if they are saying quite what they mean.
Take the Oxford Oratory. Currently, their OF masses are facing East; their EF masses they celebrate facing West.
Does NLM think this is wrong?
Putting it differently: are they arguing, like the Fathers of the Church, for Mass facing East; or do they want Mass with priest facing in the same direction as the people ... whatever that may be?
I think people should make up their minds. The Traditionalist Movement runs a real risk of superficiality.
Take the Oxford Oratory. Currently, their OF masses are facing East; their EF masses they celebrate facing West.
Does NLM think this is wrong?
Putting it differently: are they arguing, like the Fathers of the Church, for Mass facing East; or do they want Mass with priest facing in the same direction as the people ... whatever that may be?
I think people should make up their minds. The Traditionalist Movement runs a real risk of superficiality.
Calendars yet again
I first started saying the EF regularly after my first retirement, in 2001, when I went down to Devon and had churches in which there was no tradition of a daily Mass: so I was at liberty to use whatever rite I liked without any pastoral repercussions. What I said was the EF, but with the OF calendar, and with the OF elimination of "commemorations" and the OF rules on the Gloria. I know from comments on my blog that not a few clergy do this, and I still think that it would be good if the PCED regularised it.
More recently, however, I have begun to use the EF calendar at my EF Masses. I am warming to this. The advantages are that one gets an uninterrupted liturgical tradition. I use red vestments much more often, because the EF calendar still - after all these centuries - reflects the primacy of Martyrdom as a path to Sainthood and still asserts the formative experience of the entire Church in the campaigns of the "great" Imperial persecutors to expunge Christianity. I now wonder about that elaborate Introduction issued with the Novus Calendar when it was first promulgated; it carefully showed that there were in the new Universal Calendar proportionate numbers of Saints from each age of the Church and from each Continent and from each 'constituency' - Virgins; episcopal founders; etc.. This clinical committeeism now seems to me distinctly unnatural. The old Calendar does update itself by natural, organic, means. Older saints fade from memory and their observancces are reduced in rank; new ones come in and the former occupants of particular days fade into being mere commemorations. I currently have a distinct feeling that this is a more Catholic way of doing things than the post-conciliar "quota" system.
Of course, a fundamentalist adherence to "1962" is just as unnatural as quotas artificially placed like straight-jackets on the Sanctorale. For the old natural organic development to be stopped is itself deeply untraditional. And there could well be a little tidying up. For example: before 1962, S Irenaeus was on the same day as the Vigil of SS Peter and Paul. He shared the day with them. But in 1962 this was thought a bad thing and so he was shifted into the period after the Solemnity. But Bugnini then abolished Vigils, and put S Irenaeus back onto his original day. Celebrating the Saint on his 1962 date - which only held good for less than a decade - can hardly be a touchstone of safe "Traditionalism"
What are the experiences of others?
More recently, however, I have begun to use the EF calendar at my EF Masses. I am warming to this. The advantages are that one gets an uninterrupted liturgical tradition. I use red vestments much more often, because the EF calendar still - after all these centuries - reflects the primacy of Martyrdom as a path to Sainthood and still asserts the formative experience of the entire Church in the campaigns of the "great" Imperial persecutors to expunge Christianity. I now wonder about that elaborate Introduction issued with the Novus Calendar when it was first promulgated; it carefully showed that there were in the new Universal Calendar proportionate numbers of Saints from each age of the Church and from each Continent and from each 'constituency' - Virgins; episcopal founders; etc.. This clinical committeeism now seems to me distinctly unnatural. The old Calendar does update itself by natural, organic, means. Older saints fade from memory and their observancces are reduced in rank; new ones come in and the former occupants of particular days fade into being mere commemorations. I currently have a distinct feeling that this is a more Catholic way of doing things than the post-conciliar "quota" system.
Of course, a fundamentalist adherence to "1962" is just as unnatural as quotas artificially placed like straight-jackets on the Sanctorale. For the old natural organic development to be stopped is itself deeply untraditional. And there could well be a little tidying up. For example: before 1962, S Irenaeus was on the same day as the Vigil of SS Peter and Paul. He shared the day with them. But in 1962 this was thought a bad thing and so he was shifted into the period after the Solemnity. But Bugnini then abolished Vigils, and put S Irenaeus back onto his original day. Celebrating the Saint on his 1962 date - which only held good for less than a decade - can hardly be a touchstone of safe "Traditionalism"
What are the experiences of others?
Benedict XIV
A really exhilarating day yesterday, in Bodley, with the Omnia Opera of that great Pontiff (I am going through in detail his teaching on Concelebration).
What makes him most like his successor of today is his erudition and the freedom it gives him. He took immense pains to protect 'uniate' Easterners against latinization; a threat which came not from aggressive Western missionaries but from the 'uniates' themselves, who wanted the flexibility that comes with the Roman Rite (e.g. to say more than one Mass on one altar in one day). He resists attacks upon the zeon and upon filioque-free versions of the Creed. Because of his immense doctrinal weight, he can see beyond rules and easy assumptions to what really matters. He understands Byzantine spirituality because he has read Orthodox theology.
A real protoB16.
What makes him most like his successor of today is his erudition and the freedom it gives him. He took immense pains to protect 'uniate' Easterners against latinization; a threat which came not from aggressive Western missionaries but from the 'uniates' themselves, who wanted the flexibility that comes with the Roman Rite (e.g. to say more than one Mass on one altar in one day). He resists attacks upon the zeon and upon filioque-free versions of the Creed. Because of his immense doctrinal weight, he can see beyond rules and easy assumptions to what really matters. He understands Byzantine spirituality because he has read Orthodox theology.
A real protoB16.
22 October 2009
Canon Law
We Anglicans tend to be disgustingly ignorant on this subject.
For no particular reason, I found myself wondering, with regard to the Military Ordinaries they have in the RC Church: are Chaplains incardinated into their Ordinariates? Whom do Ordinariate clergy mention in the Canon?
By the way, a quite friendly RC blog gives a list of 'rites' that clergy in Pope Benedict's Ordinariates would be restricted to. But surely, these structures and their clergy will be part of the Latin Church. So, surely, they will have access to the provisions of Summorum Pontificum?
For no particular reason, I found myself wondering, with regard to the Military Ordinaries they have in the RC Church: are Chaplains incardinated into their Ordinariates? Whom do Ordinariate clergy mention in the Canon?
By the way, a quite friendly RC blog gives a list of 'rites' that clergy in Pope Benedict's Ordinariates would be restricted to. But surely, these structures and their clergy will be part of the Latin Church. So, surely, they will have access to the provisions of Summorum Pontificum?
21 October 2009
My views on the Apostolic Constitution
Some friends wonder why I haven't said much. The reason is that having expected for some time something like the Ap Con, I have already posted a lot of expressions of opinion about the practical matters involved; particularly the liturgical and those relating to clerical marriage. Just last month, for example, you could look back to Sept 9&10; Sept 12&13&14; Sept 24.
The plain fact is that the details are going to be very important and it is the details that we do not have. I suspect that the document is not actually written: we have not, you notice, been told its name (the first couple of words of the Latin text). Rowan mentioned a 'Code of Practice'; perhaps this is something mentioned to him by Levada the previous evening.
I regard as significantly positive the willingness of Rome to allow married Anglican bishops to continue to exercise episkope in the guise of prebyteral Ordinaries. The Holy Father, as in the matter of Summorum Pontificum, has not just given the minimum.
Pessimists might wonder what the English RC bishops said to Levada on Monday, and what effect that will have on the eventual form of the legislation.
The plain fact is that the details are going to be very important and it is the details that we do not have. I suspect that the document is not actually written: we have not, you notice, been told its name (the first couple of words of the Latin text). Rowan mentioned a 'Code of Practice'; perhaps this is something mentioned to him by Levada the previous evening.
I regard as significantly positive the willingness of Rome to allow married Anglican bishops to continue to exercise episkope in the guise of prebyteral Ordinaries. The Holy Father, as in the matter of Summorum Pontificum, has not just given the minimum.
Pessimists might wonder what the English RC bishops said to Levada on Monday, and what effect that will have on the eventual form of the legislation.
20 October 2009
OrthoDix
A correspondent reminds me of the old Oxford ditty
How happy are the Oxford flocks,
How free from heretics!
Their priests so very orthodox,
Their Bishop orthoDix!
relating to the close friendship between Dom Gregory Dix and Dr Kenneth Kirk, Bishop of Oxford.
How happy are the Oxford flocks,
How free from heretics!
Their priests so very orthodox,
Their Bishop orthoDix!
relating to the close friendship between Dom Gregory Dix and Dr Kenneth Kirk, Bishop of Oxford.
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