U.S. Anglican Ordinariate Emerges!

This symbol resembles the shield
of The Episcopal Church in the USA,
the traditional symbol for U.S. Anglicans,
except the stars in the blue canton
have been replaced with the papal
seal, symbolizing reunification
with Rome

THE CATHOLIC KNIGHT: The U.S. personal ordinariate for Anglicans is now officially underway. On June 15, 2011 Cardinal Donald Wuerl addressed the USCCB about the widespread interest in the United States for the pope's offer to traditional Anglicans. He announced the ordinariate would be erected in the fall of 2011.

The U.S. Anglican ordinariate will be a welcome addition to the U.S. Catholic Church, and a necessary tool for Pope Benedict XVI's liturgical "reform of the reform." Traditional Anglicanism is modeled after traditional Catholicism, with a particularly Old English ethos called the "Anglican Patrimony." Essentially, Traditional Anglicans have much more faithfully preserved the liturgical traditions of pre-conciliar Roman Catholicism, even though they were outside the communion of the Roman Catholic Church. The Traditional Anglican mass resembles in many ways the traditional Latin mass. The language used is usually Elizabethan English. Imagine, if you will, a traditional Latin mass translated into English by Shakespeare. This would be very similar, though not totally identical, to the Traditional Anglican mass. The priest usually celebrates in the ad orientem posture, communion rails are common, women are usually veiled, and communion is always served on the tongue while kneeling. The emergence of Anglican ordinariate parishes around the United States will not only serve as a bridge for mainline traditional Protestants seeking full-communion with Rome, but they will also offer general Roman Catholics a viable alternative to the typical Novus Ordo mass celebrated in the usual banal manner. The timing of the emerging ordinariate will coincide with the reformed English translation for the ordinary form of the mass in the general Roman Rite. This will create a two prong pincer assault on the post-conciliar Novus Ordo culture. This combined with the pope's instruction on his motu proprio, creating a generous provision of the traditional Latin mass, seals the deal of reform. The Modernists have nowhere left to run. They can either conform to the Holy Father's "reform of the reform" or they can leave the Church for a more liberal schismatic sect.

Cardinal Donald Wuerl
reported on the emerging
ordinariate to the USCCB

General Roman Catholics in the United States will be free to attend Anglican ordinariate parishes, societies and missions. They may even become members of such groups, though they themselves will remain under the episcopal authority of their diocesan bishop. They will not be eligible for ordinariate membership unless they have immediate family who are already within the ordinariate. That being said, Roman Catholics who marry Anglican Catholics, or who baptize their children in an ordinariate parish, will then have access to membership in the ordinariate in addition to parish membership. Let me reiterate, a general Roman Catholic DOES NOT need to be a member of the ordinariate to be a member of an ordinariate parish. Parish membership and ordinariate membership are separate. That being said, a young Roman Catholic married couple could easily join an ordinariate parish as full members, even though they would still be under the episcopal authority of their Roman diocesan bishop. Then the couple could baptize their newborn children in that same ordinariate parish, if they so desire, and that would make their children automatically ordinariate members as well as parish members. Then the parental couple could themselves apply for ordinairate membership, if they so desire, because their children are already members of the ordinariate by baptism. The reason why I am spelling out this process here is so traditionally-minded Roman Catholics have a means to access both pastoral shelter in an ordinariate parish, and if absolutely necessary, full episcopal shelter in the ordinariate itself. This may be necessary in such diocese where the Roman bishop is openly hostile to traditionally-minded Catholics.

Traditional Catholics of the Extraordinary Form (traditional Latin mass) will find kindred spirits in the emerging Anglican ordinariate. Anglican Catholics, as they will be called, have a particular affection for pre-conciliar traditions and customs. They will become the natural allies to traditional Roman Catholics, even though they will retain many of their own unique characteristics of the English patrimony. We can expect to see a good amount of crossover of Traditional Catholics attending Anglican Catholic masses, and vice versa, with Anglican Catholics attending Traditional Catholic masses. This is inevitable. So it behooves both Traditional Catholics and Anglican Catholics to reach out and make contact with each other, build friendships and work together toward common goals. (Perhaps a joint-community picnic might be a good place to start? Wherein Traditional Catholics can "welcome" their new Anglican Catholic brethren.)

The Anglican Use Pastoral Provision was created by Pope John Paul II thirty years ago, and is in many ways a precursor to the new ordinariate template. Through the Anglican Use Pastoral Provision, priests from The Episcopal Church USA were able to convert to the Roman Catholic Church, and then receive holy orders even if they were already married. This special provision was considered an "Anglican Use of the Roman Rite." The ordinariate template is based on this. It is not a separate rite within the Church but rather a subdivision of the Roman Rite. Anglican Catholics will be under the same canon law and will use the same catechism as Roman Catholics. The canon of the mass will be identical to the general Roman Rite, but the rest of the liturgy will be based on the Anglican patrimony, which as I said above, bears striking resemblance to the pre-conciliar Roman liturgy. Again, I should point out here; it is not identical to the traditional Latin mass. There are differences. These differences have, however, a much greater continuity with the pre-conciliar Roman liturgy. In comparison to the Novus Ordo "ordinary form" mass, there really is no comparison. The Traditional Anglican mass is in continuity with the pre-conciliar liturgy, while the Novus Ordo mass is not, at least not as it's typically celebrated. The new reformed English translation will "help" the Novus Ordo, but it will not fix it. The Novus Ordo needs a make over, and indeed something like that will eventually happen, but probably not for a long time.

In the mean time, traditionally-minded Catholics can now find shelter in two places. The first of course is the traditional Latin mass communities spawned by Ecclesia Dei and Summorum Pontificum. Assuming a traditional Latin mass community exists in the area, and assuming this community is not being suppressed by the local diocesan bishop, than traditionally-minded Catholics will be able to find refuge there. However, in such cases where a traditional Latin mass community is not formed, or is suppressed by an unfriendly bishop, than traditional-minded Catholics may still possibly find refuge in an Anglican ordinariate parish.

Unlike the traditional Latin mass communities, the Anglican ordinariate communities will not need to rely on the friendliness of the local diocesan bishop. Anglican ordinariate missions and parishes can be erected with or without a local diocesan bishop's approval. While the U.S. Ordinary for Anglican Catholics will of course seek cooperation and feedback from the local bishop, permission for the creation of a group is not required. Between the Latin mass Catholics citing canon law that requires a bishop to provide a traditional Latin mass, and Anglican Catholics creating new traditional-style parishes nearby, unfriendly Catholic bishops are going to find themselves between a rock and a hard place.

Elevation during the
Anglican Use mass

Of course, there is the other side of the coin. Diocesan bishops who are friendly to historical tradition will have much to benefit from all of this. I have it on good authority that the U.S. Anglican ordinariate will have no shortage of priests for the immediate short term. In fact, there will likely be a surplus -- a significant surplus. Furthermore, the U.S. Anglican ordinariate will have twice as many resources to draw upon for more vocations, both among married and unmarried men. Rome has made it clear that it intends to indefinitely maintain the Anglican tradition of allowing married men into the priesthood, in spite of what you may have recently heard at the bishop's conference in Seattle today. So while traditionalism will attract more ordinariate men to the priesthood anyway, the pool to draw upon will be exponentially greater because of the availability of married men. While Rome will not allow Roman Catholics to transfer over to the ordinariate for the sake of ordination, Rome has made it clear that so long as married men have a legitimate connection to the Anglican patrimony, either through membership in the ordinariate or a previous Anglican sect, the priesthood will remain open to them on a case-by-case basis. So the long and short of it is this. The ordinariate is going to have PLENTY of priests to go around, both for the short term and the long term. Initially there will be more priests than assignments, and for diocesan bishops friendly to tradition, those priests will be available for work. There is nothing preventing a diocesan bishop from hiring an ordinariate priest for regular diocesan work -- that is -- so long as he doesn't mind the Novus Ordo mass celebrated in the most traditional way possible. Assuming that bishop doesn't mind these priests celebrating mass ad orientem, and distributing communion on the tongue, as such ordinariate priests would be inclined to do, than it is likely there will be plenty of diocesan work to go around.

So begins the Pope Benedict's "reform of the reform" in the United States.