Thursday, November 5, 2009

Fools for Christ

A Traditional Anglican called Piperspop made the following comment on the TAC acceptance over on the Catholic Answers Forum.

"They voted to accept something they have not even seen!

What fools these mortals be!

Cardinal Levada issued 2 sections of the AC earlier this week, and there will be NO ongoing married priests after those that are currently married. This means they will not be any more likely to find priests than Roman Catholics.

I want to see if there will be anything left of Anglicanism, or if this will be like the Anglican Use, conversion of all, and gone after one generation."


Lets deal with that first comment now. I will get back to the rest in subsequent posts.

Archbishop Hepworth (TAC) has publically stated that they would have accepted a much more limited offer and that they were overwhelmed by the Pope’s generosity.

The TAC would like to present their acceptance of the Pope’s offer by Easter 2010. As they have a synodical form of government they need all of their assemblies/synods to accept before that date and therefore have a tight schedule.

While others (perhaps quite understandably, dither) they are positioning themselves to take a leadership role in early days of the ordinariates. Note the request for Bishop Mercer to be made ordinary in the UK.

The adherents of the TAC in the 1990s (and in fact well before that) were quite prescient in foreseeing that the “ordination” of women would lead to the “consecration” of women bishops and that would, as Cardinal Kasper has now made clear, make visible corporate re-union with the Catholic Church impossible. As they had read the course of events so clearly then it may be wise to pay careful attention to their actions now.

In the past they have sacrificed much to preserve Anglo-Catholicism and the hope of re-union, leaving their Anglican communities and churches behind.

Currently, they are willing to sacrifice much to be re-united. All of the married bishops will have to stand down. While some may become ordinaries they will still not be the ones ordaining their priests and deacons as Cathollic priests.

I trust that God will reward this fidelity and sacrifice and that we will see a steady growth of Anglican-Catholicism (i.e. Anglicans in full union with the Catholic Church, preserving all that does not conflict with Catholic teaching)

If they are fools then they are fools for Christ and Christian unity.

1 comment:

Braingasm said...

Have no fear for vocations. Traditionalist catholics have no shortage, and anglican-catholics will have no shortage as long as they remain faithful to catholic doctrine. It has nothing to do with celibacy. Even the novus ordo parishes have vocations in proportion to their rate of church attendance.