People have asked me to help help them understand the new Apostolic Constitution and how it differs from the Pastoral Provision under which I was ordained a Catholic priest. Please remember that this is very new and the text has not been released yet.
First, the Pastoral Provision is local and provisional. The Pastoral Provision is in effect in the United States and provides a process by which former Episcopal or Anglican priests may be considered for ordination in the Catholic Church, temporarily suspends the discipline of celibacy during the lifetime of the priest's wife, and allows for groups of former Episcopalians to retain some of their liturgical traditions using an approved modification of the Book of Common Prayer called the Book of Divine Worship. The Pastoral Provision is also in force in Great Britain, but British bishops have not approved an Anglican based liturgy. The Pastoral Provision does not apply in the rest of the world, although individual priests may convert and be considered for ordination on a case by case basis. Second, the Pastoral Provision has a limited but indefinite time-frame. Its purpose was to allow Anglicans to be absorbed into the Catholic Church. An Apostolic Constitution is issued at a much higher level of authority and is not intended to be time-limited. So it is quite possible that the Pope envisions that an Anglican community will exist within Catholicism for quite some time and even provides the possibility of separate Anglican tracks within Catholic seminaries to provide for future continuity.
The new Apostolic Constitution can apply anywhere in the world, and it provides the possibility of much more autonomy for former Anglicans. They will not have the same level of authority as the sister Eastern Rite Catholics, but there will be some similarities. It is a very, very generous gift, made in response to petitions from as many as fifty different Anglican bishops around the world. It was said that the Episcopal Diocese of Forth Worth was discussing such a move. They have since separated themselves from the Episcopal Church, but have not said definitively that they want to become Catholic. Several small Anglican parishes in Kansas City may be members of the Traditional Anglican Communion that made a petition to become Catholic. The TAC is a worldwide body.
For the easily bored and sound-bite fed U.S. audience, most news outlets will reduce this to conflicts about women and gays and then move on to the next controversy. The truth is much richer. Anglicans have been converting to the Catholic Church since the reformation. Since the 1840s, some Anglicans have been working and praying for reunion. In the late 19th century an Anglican religious order, the Francisan Friars of the Atonement (Grayfriars) joined the Catholic Church to work for reunion from within Catholicism and since then have provided the leadership for the annual Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Since Vatican II, Anglicans and Catholics have been in high level discussions aimed at creating the kinds of mutual understandings that would someday lead to reunion. Vatican II paved the way for Catholics to make the kinds of concessions Pope Benedict made that will allow Anglicans to retain some of their liturgy and spirituality, recognizing that Catholicism is enriched and not diminished by this kind of diversity. John Henry Cardinal Newman, the famous 19th century Anglican convert to Catholicism paved the way for Vatican II, and will be beatified in 2011 when the Pope visits England. Anglicans and Catholics flocked to visit the relics of Saint Therese of Lisieux as they made a very recent pilgrimage to England. Her relics rested on her feast day at York Minister, the Cathedral of the Anglican Archbishop of York. In other words, preparations for this Apostolic Constitution have been in process for 170 years, and some of the preparations have been made at levels that are higher than popes.
It is true that in the United States and Canada some Episcopalians have been willing to divide the church in order to introduce innovations to the sacraments of ordination and marriage without the authority of the rest of the church Catholic. Some believe that these actions are prophetic, and that church division is a price worth paying. For myself, these innovations raise the question of how a church that claims to be part of the Catholic Church while remaining separate from the Catholic Church can introduce fundamental changes in sacramental theology. I came to believe that simple majority votes within small slivers of the church are not sufficient to deal with fundamental doctrinal changes. It made me realize that the Episcopalian claim to be part of the Catholic Church is simply a beautiful illusion. I have always believed that the Catholic Church is essential to God's relationship with the world, and that if it was important for me to be Catholic, I needed to be in the Catholic Church. Finally realizing I was not Catholic, I joined the Catholic Church.
There's no way that all that can fit into a sound bite.
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