Uncertain future for conservative Anglican group as ordinariates begin
March 22, 2011
The Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC), the most visible organization representing Anglicans seeking to enter the Catholic Church, has seen major fissures in its ranks since Anglicanorum Coetibus offered an answer to its pleas.
Some members of the TAC criticize the group's leaders for their stance in talks with the Vatican; some--a minority--have no particular desire to restore communion with the Holy See. The Anglican communion never recognized the TAC. The Vatican was happy to make plans with TAC leaders, but the Catholic Church does not recognize the validity of Anglican orders, and thus cannot recognize TAC prelates as bishops. So as the Anglican ordinariates are established, the group is in an ecclesiastical no-man's-land.
The TAC leader, Archbishop John Hepworth, cannot become a Catholic bishop; he is divorced and remarried, and he became an Anglican only after leaving the Roman Catholic Church.
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Posted by: -
Mar. 23, 2011 6:50 AM ET USA
I am very disappointed that the best this site can do on this issue is to republish the anti-TAC, anti-Rome vitriol of Dr Virtue. As a member of the TAC preparing to enter the Ordinariate, I am also often dismayed by the 'welcome' I'm likely to receive from the jere3812s of the world. Fortunately, I know priests and people who are looking forward to a long-awaited reinfusion of the good things that the Anglicans who want to enter the Ordinariate can bring--dignified worship and orthodox belief.
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Posted by: TheJournalist64 -
Mar. 22, 2011 7:35 PM ET USA
Well, this was bound to happen, there being so many ex-Catholics, including priests, among the Anglicans and Episcopalians. The Church must stick to its principles here, because everything done becomes precedent, and there's plenty of people looking to get their camel's nose in the tent.
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Posted by: jeremiahjj -
Mar. 22, 2011 7:27 PM ET USA
I am reminded of something an old choirmaster friend said, when confronted with the dissension in the Anglican communion, "It's just a MESS!" A mess indeed! Anglican friends wanting to become Catholics must put aside 400 years of divisiveness and preconditions and come as they are. I will pray hard for a satisfactory conclusion to this conundrum; I will pray especially hard for those who must sort through the mess created by centuries of separation from the Throne of Peter.
