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THE P
Snapdragon
RTAL
Agony Uncle
February 2017 Page 5
Snapdragon writes with apologies to C S Lewis
Dear Uncle Pimpernel ,
There is something that has been puzzling me for several years . When we were still in the Church of England , there were quite a number of prominent clergy who always talked as if they would leave the Church of England and come with us into Full Communion .
I think in particular of Father Flummocks and Father Blufcald . Once , when one of our ‘ Flying Bishops ’ was rabbiting endlessly on about “ Rome Is The Answer ”, Fr B said , “ Give us a lead , Bishop , and we ’ ll follow ”. I recall that Fr F once said , “ Ten years from now I ’ ll be a retired priest in the Catholic Church ”.
But they both seem still to be firmly entrenched in seedy wastelands of Welbyland . Why is that ?
Uncle Pimpernel replies :
In fact , I could strengthen your case . In the runup to the foundation of the Ordinariate , there was a group of Diocesan Bishops who were in and out of the Offices of the Roman Curia , giving the impression that entire Anglican Dioceses would up sticks and move if Certain Eventualities took place .
Who are we to judge ? I think there is a human instinct , common perhaps in Anglicanism , towards inertia . There is another human fear , of losing what one has worked for , such as a flourishing parish that one has built up from scratch .
Perhaps there was a fear of loss of status . Perhaps some of them were anxious to blackmail the Establishment with a really potent threat : give us good terms or we ’ ll join the Ordinariate . If that is true , perhaps the trick did work : who would ever have thought that the Powers That Be would give them a mini-Church with its own separate succession of bishops consecrated by hands untainted by female hair ?
And perhaps there were some who feared that they would not meet the criteria for admission to the Ordinariate priesthood .
Dear Uncle Pimpernel ,
I ’ m a bit worried by the Ordinariate Liturgy . It ’ s so different from ordinary Catholic worship . Should we give way to our own personal tastes , our subjective likes and dislikes ? Our individual personal preferences are so often contentious . They seem to be shaped by aesthetical preoccupations .
Uncle Pimpernel replies :
Two points . Firstly : “ ordinary Catholic worship ” is not nearly as set in stone as perhaps you think . There are , it is true , parishes galore still set in a 1970s time warp . Shabby liturgy , drearily soppy musical offerings , priests who think that folksiness is the way to engage with their congregations . But those clergy and their people are very often of a certain age .
One wonders where they will all be in a couple of decades ’ time . But there are also places where there are young and wellformed clergy ( the Oratorians spring to mind ) who have quite different concepts of priestly ministry and of worship . Good liturgy , fine music , and excellent preaching and teaching are the order of the day . Perhaps this is the growth and the newness which God is giving to the English Church .
My second point is this . Pope Benedict set us up to be different . The Missal which , under his auspices , has been given to the Ordinariates , introduces quite a different type of language from that even of the ‘ new ’ Missal . It contains powerful elements from the old Anglican and Anglo-Catholic traditions ; words and worship that have a real power to attract people with a sense of the mystery of the Eucharist . This must be a real gift to English Catholicism , even if the older and more rigid cradle Catholics find it disconcerting .
THE P RTAL
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