The Anglo-Catholic has helpfully posted a transcript of Fr Keith Newton's press conference last week. If you prefer to listen to it, the CBCEW website has recordings. The transcript is in two parts:
The Ordinary in Plain Text
The Ordinary in Plain Text: Part II
Here are a few quotations on points that I thought significant. For the context you have to read the whole text of listen to the audio but I hope that I haven't misrepresented anything:
HQ
The Ordinariate has been given an office in Eccleston Square for the time beingWalsingham
The authorities at the Anglican shrine at Walsingham want to explore ways in which members of the Ordinariate can continue to worship there.Liturgy
The CDF are fairly keen that there should be one liturgy for the Ordinariates wherever they are, not lots of different ones.Estimating numbers
I’d guess it will be about two dozen groups. Mostly around the South of England in the province of Canterbury; some in the North but not many. And about probably between fifty and sixty priests.Places of worship
Obviously there will be places where it will be easiest to worship in Catholic premises. There may be possibilities where there are some Catholic premises which are underused. There may be places where there will be a sharing agreement. There was never any idea that the Ordinariate would take buildings. That was just the Press. One or two bishops have said to me warm things about sharing. It obviously depends on the numbers going from that congregation. We don’t want any rancour or bad feeling.Not inward-looking
I hope this is going to be an evangelistic tool. I think it's part of the Pope’s vision for the evangelisation of Europe; it’s just a very small part. I hope the Ordinariate is not going to live for itself, and look beyond its borders to be evangelistic.Patrimony not just in liturgy
I suppose it will be a very English form of Catholicism. It might have a particular way of getting into the communities that perhaps Catholic priests have not had.Advice for those thinking of taking the step
Be courageous, trust in the Lord.My impression from reading the transcript is that Fr Newton is facing a gargantuan task in getting the Ordinariate up and running but that he is just the man to do it, with the help of Fr Burnham and Fr Broadhurst and the initial group of priests and religious.
Meanwhile, an Ordinariate is set to be established in Australia by Pentecost this year, and will include Japan. See The Record.
8 comments:
Interesting to see you say 'Father (as he prefers to be called) Newton ...'
What else should he be called? After all, he is not a bishop.
Let's hope the office at Eccleston Square is for the short time being, not the long time being.
What a pity the Franciscan house next to the Cathedral was sold off. It would have been an ideal base.
I agree re: the gargantuan task. It must be like setting up a brand new railway system and having to build tracks of a slightly different gauge that will have to link in with the existing network.
Might there be a certain "south-east of England" perspective in some of this? Growing up in the north of England, I never had the impression that Catholicism was somehow perceived as "foreign" or "un-English". I don't think Catholic priests (including the many Irish ones) had particular problems in getting through to the English people. I think cheeky phrases of the past such as "the Italian mission to the Irish" chiefly had their origin in London and its environs.
The Ordinariate is a wonderful development and will certainly offer Anglicans attached to their patrimony a good way of coming into full communion with the Catholic Church. It was, of course, set up in response to the requests of Anglo-Catholics, but for I'm not sure that, as regards evangelising the populace as a whole, the Ordinariate will offer something very different from what the Catholic Church already offers.
As Fr Keith Newton puts it:
"I’d guess it will be about two dozen groups. Mostly around the South of England in the province of Canterbury; some in the North but not many. And about probably between fifty and sixty priests."
See also his remarks about liturgy.
No mention of how many laypeople. And a frank admission that the decision to create an Ordinariate for this particular constituency, in no sense one for which this provision was ever designed, is about preserving the Anglo-Catholic subculture of London, of certain Oxford academic institutions, and of the South Coast. We all know what that means...
fr - Rev, Very Rev, etc. Father is a relatively recent designation for secular priests. The late Mgr Gilbey did not like it.
“The CDF are fairly keen that there should be one liturgy for the Ordinariates wherever they are, not lots of different ones.”
It interesting to note that in the various “Angl0-Catholic” blogs and among the traditional minded Roman Catholic blogs no one has made any remarks about the above…concerning Liturgy. Here in the USA most Anglican groups wishing to go to Rome are worshipping using the “American/Anglican” Missal…they are not interested in a Novus Ordo in Middle English. I would conjunct that this “one liturgy” for the Ordinariate stance might keep many from crossing the Tiber, as it called these days.
Just an observation from someone outside both communions.
How about Sir instead of Father, as per Sir Christopher Trychay pp, then vicar, of Morebath during the upheaval of the Reformation.
Sir was the usual honorary term for priests according to Eamon Duffy in his wonderful book The Voices of Morebath.
Sir Tim Finigan has a certain ring to it.
Jamie Bogle recently told me the same and that he would call me Sir Tim from now on instead of Father!
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