Ordination in the Catholic Church of those previously ordained as Anglicans

I have been giving much thought and prayer to the topic of Anglican orders and the ordination of former Anglican clergy in the Catholic Church. What exactly do they bring with them? Their wives, of course, are the most visible and talked-about feature of married Anglicans being ordained to the priesthood in the Ordinariates of the Catholic Church.

Then there is the question of the meaning of former ministry and the character of ordination in the Anglican Communion. Candidates for Catholic ordination after many years in Anglican ministry must deal with this question of moment for them and for their friends who remain in Anglican orders. As well, the question continues to be asked of those who made the journey across the Tiber years ago. To date over 1000 former Anglicans have been ordained Catholic priests over the past 20 years (most in the UK).

Some of the more than one thousand former Anglicans ordained to the Catholic priesthood.

In an insightful article,"Anglican Orders – Recognised or Received?" (The Messenger No. 292, April-August 2010), Fr. Mark Woodruff reflects upon the theology of Catholic ordination as well as the experience of the  now thousand plus former Anglican priests. 

Fr. Woodruff states that the Catholic Magisterium affirms liturgically that:

"Anglican clergy are ordained 'in some sense'. 

For those received in 1994 and throughout Cardinal Hume’s  tenure [Catholic Primate of England and Wales], this continued to be recognised officially and liturgically. We were told that we were free to petition for conditional ordination like Dr Graham Leonard (the retired Anglican Bishop of London, who had been ordained to the Catholic priesthood in April of that year), in case there might be sufficient evidence to establish a “prudent doubt” as to our ordination’s invalidity too. But we were also warned that the process was complex and verification could take some time. Given this array of considerations, each of us was satisfied that a request to be ordained absolutely was the right course. 

If there were any doubts in our minds, they were allayed by the spirit of the preamble and prayer devised by Cardinal Hume and inserted prior to the Litany of the Saints leading up to the prayer of conditional ordination for Dr Leonard. This remarkable interpolation, which constitutes a part of the “absolute” ordination rite for former Anglican clergy, at the discretion of the ordaining bishop, is worth giving in full: 


Oratio ad gratias agendas pro ministerio ab electo in Communione anglicana expleto [Prayer for giving thanks for the ministry of the candidate completed in the Anglican Communion] 

Deinde omnes surgunt. Episcopus, deposita mitra, stans manibus iunctis versus ad electum dicot   [Then all rise. The bishop, having set down his mitre, standing with his hands joined and turned toward the candidate, says:]


N., the Holy Catholic Church recognizes that not a few of the sacred actions of the Christian religion as carried out in communities separated from her can truly engender a life of grace and can rightly be described as providing access to the community of salvation. And so we now pray.


Et omnes, per aliquod temporis spatium, silentio orant. Deinde, manus extensis, Episcopus orat dicens [And all pray in silence for a while. Then, with hands extended, the Bishop prays, saying]:


Almighty Father, we give you thanks for the X years of faithful ministry of your servant N. in the Anglican Communion, whose fruitfulness for salvation has been derived from the very fullness of grace and truth entrusted to the Catholic Church. As your servant has been received into full communion and now seeks to be ordained to the presbyterate in the Catholic Church, we beseech you to bring to fruition that for which we now pray. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Populus acclamat [The people acclaim]: Amen."

Deacons during the Litany of the Saints at their ordination to the Catholic priesthood.

Fr. Woodruff goes on in his article to explore how these ordinations and future Catholic ordinations of Anglicans will affect the call to unity to which many Anglicans and Catholics seek to be faithful to. 

He refers to Father Paul Couturier who was responsible for re-founding of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity in Lyon, France, in much the spirit of the former Anglican American Franciscan, Fr. Paul Wattson of Graymoor, NY.  

Fr. Couturier had imagined how unity could be achieved by different traditions “vying” with each other i.e.  imitating and outdoing each other in the pursuit of ever greater holiness – towards union with God in Christ and unity with each other (Decree on Ecumenism §11). 

He called this spiritual emulation which did not envision the extinction of Anglicanism or other traditions of separated brethren in ecclesial communities. Fr. Couturier looked for what he saw as the interplay of distinct traditions within the one Great Church of Jesus Christ with the traditions shared not absorbed. He called this parallélaboration.  

However, each Christian tradition has suffered because of the sin of separation and so each is deprived of the fullness of the riches that God gives for his people. By taking steps towards unity in repentance each tradition learns to need the other and the patrimony which each brings to the one Church. This humility to learn involves a self-emptying after the pattern of Jesus himself . 

Ordination of former Anglican clergy in the Catholic Church brings together two shards of the one Church of Christ, into which we have all been baptized. The one vessel, from which the shards come, was broken at the time of the Reformation. This is how Fr. Aidan Nichols, in his prophetic address to the 2011 Toronto Anglican Ordinariate Conference, envisioned a healing of the Church with the Ordinariates bringing people from both sides of the Reformation rift together in unity while retaining their own patrimony of Christian life and culture.

Such a vision helps all of us see what God is doing through the Ordinariates and the ordinations which are to serve the greater unity of Christ's one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.

St. Thomas More honoured at Tower of London Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula (in Chains)

The Catholic Church in England has reported as follows:

. . . 22 October [2013], at the Tower of London, The [Catholic] Archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Nichols, and The [Anglican] Bishop of London, Richard Chartres, and General the Lord Dannatt launched The 1535 Society.

Side of the Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula, viewed from near the place of execution on Tower Green Tower,perhaps St. Thomas More's last view, on earth, of the Chapel.

St. Thomas More Prayer, The Bishop of London         

O Lord, give us a mind

that is humble, quiet, peaceable,
patient and charitable,
and a taste of your Holy Spirit
in all our thoughts, words and deeds.
O Lord, give us a lively faith, a firm hope,
a fervent charity, a love of you.
Take from us all lukewarmness in meditation
and all dullness in prayer.
Give us fervour and delight in thinking of you,
your grace, and your tender compassion toward us.
Give us, good Lord,
the grace to work for
the things we pray for.
Amen.

The Archbishop of Westminster's Prayer        

O God, who in martyrdom,
have brought true faith to its highest expression,
graciously grant that,
strengthened through the intercession of Saint Thomas More,
we may confirm by witness of our life
that faith we profess with our lips,
and our unity be ever deepened.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
One God, for ever and ever.
Amen.

Photo:  stpeteradvincula.comflickr.com/photos/catholicism

The 1535 Society aims to promote an understanding of the role within British history of St Thomas More and the other Christian martyrs who lost their lives in pursuit of their religious beliefs. Its members will also, together, contribute to the restoration of the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula at the Tower of London and its Crypt of St Thomas More.

The Archbishop and the Bishop, together with the Chaplain of the Chapel Royal HM Tower of London, The Rev Canon Roger Hall, said prayers both written by and for St Thomas More as part of proceedings.

The Chapel Royal of St Peter ad Vincula is the parish church to the Tower of London and is a Chapel Royal, directly under the jurisdiction of The Queen. It's the final resting place of three queens of England as well as St Thomas More and Bishop John Fisher.St Thomas More was Lord Chancellor to Henry VIII and was imprisoned in the Tower of London between 1534 and 1535. He was held in the Bell Tower, where some of yesterday’s proceedings were conducted, and his opposition to the Reformation led to his execution on Tower Hill on 6 July 1535. The 1535 Society is named in his honour.In 2012, The Constable of the Tower of London, General the Lord Dannatt, launched an appeal to restore the chapel and to secure the future of the Choral Foundation. Contributors to The 1535 Society will help the appeal reach its £1.5m target and will, in particular, enable the restoration of the Crypt of St Thomas More.

General the Lord Dannatt said:"The Chapel is a vital focal point for the Tower community and St Thomas More is a key figure in the Tower’s history. I am enormously grateful to the Archbishop of Westminster and the Bishop of London in joining together in honouring a saint of both main Christian traditions and other Christian martyrs, and in helping us give the Chapel and the Crypt the care that they deserve."

The Archbishop of Westminster and The Bishop of London released a joint statement saying:"We must never forget our past if we want to walk wisely into the future. That is why it is so important that we preserve this shrine to remind us of the dangers of religious intolerance and to recall men and women of faith to the primacy of love for God which leads to love of neighbour".

You can view a set of images from the launch of The 1535 Society on  Flickr photo stream:

flickr.com/photos/catholicism

Correspondence with a young person being received into full communion

The following is correspondence with a young person who has just completed EVANGELIUM and is preparing to be received into the full communion of the Catholic Church in Toronto on November 3.

She had read the recent posting here on the Blessed Virgin Mary and was wondering about some of her Protestant friends' questions and how best to respond to them.

As I write this, it is a great grace and a true joy to report that the lady, of very advanced years, who was the subject of postings some years ago on PEREGRINATIONS was received into full communion last Sunday.

She is my mother and at age 97 is now the senior member of the Ordinariate in Canada.  I am told that there is a 100 year old member recently received in Philadelphia.

In 2011,  a posting here "Letter to Margaret: To an Evangelical Anglican Friend" was actually correspondence with Mum about the call to unity in the Catholic Church. With prayer and conversation she came to a clear-minded decision to be received into full communion.

Fr. Lee Kenyon of St. John the Evangelist, Calgary, after receiving Mum (97)  into full communion.
Baptized in the Pentecostal church 80 years ago, she has had a remarkable journey!

It was a great privilege to be present as Fr. Kenyon anointed her and we then shared in Holy Communion in unity with the universal Church for the first time on Canadian Thanksgiving Day.  I can only quote my mother, Marjorie, a CWAC (Canadian army) veteran of the Second World War. She served in England where she met another Canadian, a dentist, my father.

As she said, we are left "in wordless wonder at the mysterious grace of God."

"And soul by soul and silently her shining bounds increase . . . "  
         from the hymn "I VOW TO THEE MY COUNTRY" in which Sir Cecil Spring-Rice refers to "another country" whose capital is the City of God.



Now, here is the correspondence with one in her 20's.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hello Elizabeth (not her real name)

I thought you might find this of interest in light of our conversations at EVANGELIUM:

"All generations shall call me blessed." . . . What were the generations before the Blessed Virgin Mary?

P.

-----------------------------------------------------

Hello, 

Happy to hear from you!  . . .  :)

I read with interest the subject on Peregrinations. I never have asked that question, myself, and it is a very good one!  I enjoyed reading the response!

Pertaining to Mary's perpetual virginity, I must ask your opinion on this counter article:

http://carm.org/did-mary-have-other-children

Of course, this organization preaches predestination, which I have never concurred with; hence, I do not hold much (if anything) of what they say as gospel.  However, their argument against Mary's perpetual virginity is certainly one I've heard before from many other Prostestant organizations.  I would love to know your thoughts on it, whenever you get a chance to have a browse.  There is no urgency :)

God bless,
Elizabeth 

-----------------------------------------------------------

Hello again Elizabeth,

Here is a brief response to your e-mail and the attached article re. the BVM (see attached).

Better still, here are a couple of links to An Essay on the Development of Doctrine that you may want to read or at least you may want to look at a couple of chapters. It is the standard Catholic work on the development of magisterial teaching by that famous former Anglican, Cardinal Newman:

http://www.newmanreader.org/works/development/

This is a related article form a recent lecture:

http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=7757

Independent of his theology, Newman is valued and read by many because he is one of the greatest English stylists of all time.  If you haven't already, sometime you will want to read his Apologia Pro Vita Sua, a classic of Catholic apologetics and personal witness.

We keep you in our prayers and hope to see you this Sunday for our STM general meeting.

Peregrinus

Our Lady of Walsingham, St. Peter, St. John the Baptist, St. John the Evangelist, St. John Houghton, St. Thomas More, St. Edmund Campion, St. Kateri Tekakwitha, Blessed John Henry Newman, pray for us.

"Catholics of the Anglican Patrimony" by Fr Aidan Nichols, O.P.

If you have not yet read Fr. Nichols little book published recently giving the history of the Anglican Ordinariates and their raison d'être, do get a copy.

He begins with an insightful analysis of the three streams in Anglicanism and how they have ebbed and flowed from the 16th century to the present. The High Church (later Anglo-Catholic), the Evangelical (Low Church) and the Latitudinarian (liberal) streams have each held the ascendency in different periods and in various parts of the world.

In the words of Fr. Stephen Smuts:

"The book is an extended essay and arose from a remarkable lecture delivered under the auspices of the Ordinariate, as part of a conference on its place and purpose with the work of New Evangelisation. Fr Nichols revisited a familiar and resonant theme of his, that proclamation and evangelisation do not concern only the personal individual but groups and traditions of people, including entire cultures and histories. This understanding, incidentally, lay within Pope Benedict’s presentation of evangelisation on his visit to Great Britain in 2010. Faith alone, he said, answers humanity’s profoundest questions and longings; hence the need and benefit for the constant and public dialogue of faith and reason, between the Church of Christ and society, the state, politics, commerce and culture."

The constant Erastian tendency which would allow the state and secular power to dominate the Church is highlighted as Fr. Nichols describes what has led to the last stand of Anglo-Catholics in the C of E and elsewhere. This struggle is discussed in light of the now obvious fact that as Evangelicals continue to split with the liberal establishment in the erstwhile Anglican Communion, the only place for Catholic Anglicans to survive and grow is within the full communion of the Catholic Church.

Fr. Nichols provides an outline of how the various elements of the 500 year Anglican patrimony can be joined with the 1000 previous years of Catholic mission and witness in Britain and elsewhere. He sees not only Romanizing Anglo-papists coming into the Ordinariates but inner city pastors and Anglicans seeking the stability of the magisterium. Evangelicals like Fr. Gibson at St. John's in Calgary are also leading historically aware people into full communion. As Blessed J.H. Newman tell us "To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant."

Anglican Ordinariates are a small but growing fact in the UK, North America and Australia as they bring their patrimony of music, pastoral care and liturgy into the service of the universal Church. The roots of this idea of Anglican communities united with but not absorbed by the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church  has come to fruition over the past thirty years.

Fr. Nichols pays tribute to Pope Benedict XVI for his vision and determination to move ecumenical relations forward after the impasse with official liberals in the West.  He explores the liturgical gifts that the Holy Father was keen to bring into the broad landscape of Catholic liturgies which include many Eastern and Western rites.

This book by the magisterial Fr. Nichols is a must-read for those coming into the ordinariates providing, as it does, a vista of the history and potential for Anglican culture and ministry fully in communion with  the Church, it's Catholic witness and the New Evangelization.

"All generations shall call me blessed." . . . What were the generations before the Blessed Virgin Mary?

In conversation at a dinner party with a non-practising Jewish man (he had been raised in an Orthodox Jewish family), the question of Jesus' genealogy came up. 

He told me that he had, some time before, gone to the Toronto School of Theology with a request to have the Luke 3 and Matthew 1 genealogies explained since neither, in his view, referred directly to Mary's genealogy.

After saying that the Luke genealogy was that of Mary's lineage, the somewhat embarrassed TST official failed to prove his point from the text and had to concede that the Luke 3 text was traced to Joseph as well.

The point this man was trying to make was that Mary may not have been Jewish. I had never heard such a claim. He went on to say that there was no evidence and that she might well have been from one of the many other tribes or cultural groups in and around Galilee. 

This got me to do some searching and thinking. The following are some thoughts that I have collected from various sources on the lineage of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Marian theology generally.

BTW - My Jewish friend insisted that the practice of tracing Jewish lineage traced from the mother's line has not always been the custom in Judaism. He claims that this was a later development and was not the practice in the time of Jesus earthly ministry since people looked to their tribal male ancestors as witness the lists of ancestors in both Matthew and Luke. 

The following are some responses to questions about Mary's heritage and her theological role.

Questions about Marian Theology                  

A.  How is the Blessed Virgin Mary connected to the claim that she is the Messianic “Daughter of Zion”, uniting in herself the three principal aspects of the Messianic People of God – spouse of Yahweh, Mother-Zion, Virgin Israel?

The Blessed Virgin Mary (Luke 1: 48) is the Messianic “Daughter of Zion” as:

1)   Spouse of Yahweh:  Blessed Mary is the Jewish woman who co-operated with God, making possible the Incarnation of the eternal Son of God. In light of this co-operation Mary is both the daughter of Zion and the Jewish mother of the longed-for Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth (Catechism of the Catholic Church, hereafter CCC, 488-489). She fulfills the call and hope of Israel by uniting her will with that of the one and eternal God known to her Jewish community as Yahweh.

This same God reveals to humanity through the action of the Incarnation the three persons of the one God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Mary’s son, the only begotten of the Father, is Jesus (Hebrew: Yeshua) the Saviour of humanity, both fully human and fully God. By the will of the eternal Father through the action of God the Holy Spirit and in co-operation with Mary, the Daughter of Zion, Christ came to be born of the immaculate flesh of Blessed Mary, becoming the long-expected Messiah promised by Yahweh.

2)  Mother-Zion: Blessed Mary embodies Zion, the holy city, through whom God reveals the fullness of his grace and mercy in the person of Jesus. Mary, the daughter of Zion participates as Mother-Zion in the fulfillment of the messianic promise in time and space.

Jesus, who himself replaces the Temple of Jerusalem (Zion), is the son of the daughter of Zion. In his person, Jesus, as son of Mother-Zion, embodies humanity in complete union with God. Jesus, as son of Israel (Zion), through Mary (if Jewish identity is being traced through the female line) and/or Joseph (as adoptive father) brings salvation to Israel.

The Gospel according to Luke affirms what was generally known, namely, that Mary was a cousin of Elizabeth, who was the Jewish wife of the priest Zechariah of the priestly division of Abijah. Elizabeth was part of the lineage of Aaron and so both she and Mary were of the tribe of Levi (Luke 1:5;1:36).

We know from the Hebrew tradition that Moses’ brother Aaron was married to Elisheba of the tribe of Judah, so all his descendents are from both the tribes of Levi and Judah (Numbers 1:7 & Exodus 6:23). The relationship of Mary with Elizabeth on the maternal side (hence Mary’s visit to Elizabeth while pregnant) shows that Mary, like Joseph, to whom she was betrothed, was of the House of David and so of the tribe of Judah. Marriage within the tribe was common and even expected in that period. The genealogy of Jesus through Mary is from Nathan, the third son of King David and Bathsheba (Luke 3). Joseph has his genealogy from King Solomon (Matthew 1).

The independent sources of evidence for this genealogy and the life of Jesus generally are as strong and in many cases stronger than evidence for most personages in the ancient world. The main Jewish source, Josephus, is independent of the Roman source, Tacitus, who is independent, in turn, of the Christian sources i.e. the Synoptic Gospels and the Pauline letters (The Cambridge Companion to Jesus, Markus N. A. Bockmuehl, ed. 2001, pages 122-126).

As St. Paul tells us: salvation is for the Jews first and then for all (Epistle to the Romans).  Consequently, Mary is also Mother of the Church (Lumen Gentium, hereafter LG, Chapter 8: 53, 63) in fulfillment not abrogation of the Law of Israel. She is the “New Eve” of the House of King David (Luke 1:27) and is the fulfillment of the promise to the daughters of Zion (Zephaniah 3: 14, 17a). She becomes the “Mother of Christians” (hodigitria), the one who “shows the way” (CCC 2674).

3)  Virgin Israel: The purity of the daughter of Israel provides the essential condition for the Immaculate Conception i.e. a means for the eternal and all good God to become incarnate through flesh that is untainted by sin.

Mary is a virgin of the Chosen People so that the revelation of God to the People of Israel is for the Jews first and then for the Gentiles (Romans 1:16). As noted, Mary –  the Virgin Israel – becomes the Mother of the Church (LG, Chapter 8). This belief is of ecclesiological significance in that Mary provides the bridge from Israel to all humanity by bringing God into the world for her own people and then for all (the universal salvific will of Yahweh). This is the fulfillment of the Messianic Promise, the will of God to bring salvation to all people by means of the co-operation of a human person, the Daughter of Zion.

B.  If Mary’s life is an example for us by her response to God, what is the ultimate meaning of her virginity?

Mary developed her intimate relationship with Christ as a virgin preserved from Original Sin (Irenaeus, Ambrose of Milan, Tertullian and Augustine). She chose to obey the will of God by responding “yes to God” when asked to bear the incarnate son of God. The incarnation of Jesus was made possible by her purity in that she was filled with grace and so through her immaculate body Christ, the Messiah of Israel, took flesh in the Incarnation by the power of the Holy Spirit (Nicene Creed). By virtue of her own Immaculate Conception (CCC 490) Mary was prepared to make her fiat (Luke 1: 28-38). By her response Mary became, by grace, was able to become the mother of Jesus the Christ (Messiah) by means of the Virgin Birth (CCC 495 - 511).

Therefore, Mary shares in Jesus' victory over sin (Immaculate Conception – CCC 491- 492 ) and death (Assumption – CCC 966). As Mother of the Church (CCC 975), she shares this great victory with all who say “yes to God” in Christ by prevenient grace. We become her children by grace and we grow in faith by responding to her Son, Jesus Christ, who has redeemed our flesh by the perfection of his sacrifice in and through his immaculate flesh, which is possible because Jesus is “born of the Virgin Mary” (Nicene Creed).

In Blessed Mary we see the unity of virginity and motherhood with the understanding that Mary's spousal relationship to God is that of a virgin – her total gift to God. Her motherhood in relationship to the Church is, then, a result of the grace of her virginal self-giving to God. Mary’s blessing for us is due to her faith in Christ. She is, as a result of her affirmation, the first Christian and as such shows us the way to our own victory over sin and death through grace. She is the exemplary realization of the Church responding to God by grace and working in the world to redeem the whole human person in the flesh and spirit.

C.  How can we explain the connection between the revealed truth of Mary’s divine motherhood (Theotokos) and her other special gifts: the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption?

The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception affirms that Mary, preserved from original sin, becomes by virtue of her fiat, Mother of God Incarnate (Council of Ephesus), the Theotokos (CCC 495). Being the “All-Holy”, Panagia (LG 56), Mary is preserved from sin in order that she may be a fit vessel for the incarnation of God (CCC 490). 

Her virginal motherhood is “accessible only to faith” (CCC 498), a faith which, in the words of Ignatius of Antioch’s letter to the Ephesians, is understood through the “connection of these mysteries with one another” (Ignatius, Letter to the Ephesians 1, 1: AF II/2, 76- 80). The virginal motherhood of Mary is confirmed in the doctrine of the Assumption of Mary as the Aeiparthanos (Ever-virgin). In this doctrine we see that the virginal motherhood is sanctified in the Dormition of Blessed Mary (CCC 966).

The Church holds together these teachings about the gifts of Mary despite the fact that people at the time of the Apostles, as they are today, were sceptical and unbelieving (1 Corinthians 2:8). 

The unified doctrine of Blessed Mary points to the working of God’s grace (“we have received all these things by grace.” – John 1:16), grace given to humanity from our conception until our entrance into the Kingdom of God after death. As it has been for Mary, by grace, so it may be for all those baptized into the life of God the Holy Trinity. Mary prays for her children as Mother of the Church while all generations call her blessed (Luke 1:48) and seek the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Advocate, Helper, Benefactress and Mediatrix (LG 62).

References:

CCC          Catechism of the Catholic Church

LG             Lumen Gentium (Documents of Vatican II)

CCJ           The Cambridge Companion to Jesus, Markus N. A.                          Bockmuehl, ed. 2001

LE             Ignatius, Letter to the Ephesians

Msgr Steenson in Canada

Msgr Jeffrey Steenson (CSP Ordinary) with Archbishop Terrence Prendergast at St. Adele, Quebec for the CCCB meeting, September 2013. Abp. Prendergast has ordained men to the priesthood in Canada for Msgr Steenson. 

As a member of the Canadian Council of Catholic Bishops our Ordinary, though not a bishop, Msgr Steenson has a voice at their meetings. He also has warm friendships with a number of the bishops there who are friends of the CSP Ordinariate and the cause of Christian unity which it works toward.

St. Adele is a lovely place at any time of year but particularly colourful in the autumn. We pray that our bishops and our ordinary will be strengthened for service as they share prayer and fellowship.

May St. Michael the Archangel guard and protect them in their proclamation of the Gospel.

Updated Website for St Thomas More, Toronto

The website for the Toronto Anglican Ordinariate mission - St. Thomas More is:

http://www.thomasmorechurch.ca

You will find updated information about the community, Mass times, clips of choir music and information about Evangelium courses.  Make our website a regular stop and give us your feedback.

You may also be interested in the Salt and Light interview in May with Msgr Steenson on the TV show 

"Witness" if you have not seen it yet.

May Interview with Msgr Steenson - WITNESS

§ “We cannot go to heaven in featherbeds.”

—Life of Thomas More by William Roper; More to his children, c. 1510

Toronto Anglican Ordinariate Choir begins new season at St. Thomas More Mission, Sacré-Coeur Church

Here is the clip of an offertory motet for double choir, Ecce Vicit Leo by Peter Philips, sung by the St. Thomas More Anglican Ordinariate Choir  at Sacré-Coeur Church in Toronto recently.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6u98TpZ1cNs

Ecce vicit Leo de tribu Juda,
radix David aperire librum,
et solvere septem signacula eius. Alleluia.
Dignus est Agnus qui occisus est
accipere virtutem, et divinitatem,
et sapientiam, et fortitudinem, et honorem,
et gloriam, et benedictionem. Alleluia.
 - Revelation 5: 5, 12 -

Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah,
the root of David, hath prevailed to open the book
and to loose the seven seals thereof. Alleluia.
Worthy is the Lamb that was slain
to receive power, and riches,
and wisdom, and strength, and honour,
and glory, and blessing. Alleluia.


St. Thomas More Mission,
Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter
Sacré-Coeur Church,
Toronto, ON

"Anglican Patrimony in full communion with the Catholic Church."

SUNG MASS WITH FOUR PART CHOIR
EVERY SUNDAY AT 1:45 p.m.

EVANGELIUM course at Sacré-Coeur, Toronto

ORDINARIATE EVANGELIUM COURSE UNDERWAY . . . Still time to join the group.
Pope Francis announced this Spring that he was expanding the mandate of the Anglican Ordinariates for the New Evangelization. 
Those who have been baptized in the Catholic Church but have never received the sacraments of Confirmation and First Communion my also prepare with and be received into full communion through the Ordinariates.

Of course, all non-Catholics are welcome as well. If you are baptized already you can join our Evangelium Group to explore the Catholic Faith with a view to reception. If not baptized we will work out an RCIA (Christian baptismal initiation) version of Evangelium for you.

This past week we covered the first five subjects (p. 1 - 10 of the Evangelium Participant's book) but those who would still like to join may contact us at peregrinusto@gmail.com.

With a review of the first subjects, you are ready to join our seekers group. We can provide you with a book. Sessions are every Sunday until October 6 with a view to reception before Advent this year.

We meet Sundays at 12:30 - 1:30 pm (just before the Anglican Use Sung Mass) at Sacré-Coeur Church, corner of Sherbourne and Carlton, Toronto. We are meeting in the parish hall.
Of course, all non-Catholics are welcome as well. If you are baptized already you can join our Evangelium Group to explore the Catholic Faith with a view to reception. If not baptized we will work out an RCIA (Christian baptismal initiation) version of Evangelium for you.
This past week we covered the first five subjects (p. 1 - 10 of the Evangelium Participant's book) but those who would still like to join may contact us at peregrinusto@gmail.com.
With a review of the first subjects, you are ready to join our seekers group. We can provide you with a book. Sessions are every Sunday until October 6 with a view to reception before Advent this year.
We meet Sundays at 12:30 - 1:30 pm (just before the Anglican Use Sung Mass) at Sacré-Coeur Church, corner of Sherbourne and Carlton, Toronto. We are meeting in the parish hall.

The Real Presence of Christ is the Eucharist

At an Anglican Use wedding in Toronto recently, one which included a beautiful Byrd Sung Mass and traditional Anglican hymns, I had a conversation with a member of the Anglican Church of Canada who attended. He had sung for years in Anglo-Catholic parish choirs and is an observant Christian who has considered entering into full communion with the Catholic Church through the Ordinariate.

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One of the stumbling blocks for him is the Catholic understanding of the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist, Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), Part 2, Article 5. His Anglican view is that Christ is present but in a symbolic way. He is troubled with the teaching that the bread and wine of the eucharist truly and really become the body and blood of our Lord.

This is a difficulty that even many high church Anglicans, Lutherans and others share. The language of transubstantiation as laid out by the medieval scholastics and St. Thomas Aquinas is difficult to interpret in a secular and scientific age. The Catholic teaching that the substance of bread and wine truly become the body, blood, soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ (CCC 1373-81) seems to stretch credibility as much as these people believe that Christ is present "spiritually". 

This idea of a symbolic sacrament seems to be related to the often expressed notion that you can be "spiritual" without being religious. It is the  vague notion that spirituality is what I feel at the moment and God is sort of around but not in any way that impinges on the "real" (read material) world.

The Catholic doctrine of the Real Presence is tied to a number of crucial teachings about the Church as the Body of Christ in the real world. I will list some of these crucial areas that the teaching of the Real Presence touches upon and will try to connect these essentials to what Anglicans and others believe.





1.  THE COMMAND TO CONSUME THE 
     BODY OF CHRIST

Jesus, as recorded in the Gospel according to St. John, specifically, emphatically and, for Jewish believers, scandalously, said: "Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you have no life in you." (John 6:53)

Such a statement, particularly in light of the traditional Jewish teaching re. the sacredness of the human body and blood, is shocking and radical. The Jews of Jesus time on earth believed, as do many today, that to touch blood or a dead body makes one ritually unclean and there are  many practices established to maintain respect for the body. 

Any notion or even a reference to consuming any part of the body was anathema. Yet, St. John picks up and emphasizes the radical nature of Jesus' unique offering of himself and the sacramental reality that Jesus provides for those who will share in his life by means of physically and sacramentally consuming the substance of his life - his very body - in a dramatically real way.

The substance of Christ is offered in the Eucharistic sacrifice which, though made once for all on Calvary, is re-presented in all its spiritual reality in each Mass. Each Mass is the sacrifice of Christ made present once again for us. The substance of the sacrifice, Jesus himself, is present and by his own command is to be consumed so that we may be part of Him as He is of us. (CCC 1384-90)

The Catholic Church always hastens to add that the sacrifice of the Mass is an unbloody sacrifice because the "accidents", that is to say, the appearance, texture and the physical aspects of the bread and wine remain unchanged. However, the 'substance' is changed i.e. the category of medieval philosophy: 'substance' is used to identify the reality that the Eucharistic action is the presentation of the real body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ at the altar under the forms of bread and wine. 

When theologians defined transubstantiation it was accepted by many philosophers and society at large that reality was that which participated most closely in the divine. This classical idealism placed less emphasis on the physical world - the accidents of shape, size, colour, etc. As with Plato, the real world is the world of ideas or forms - that is where the substance of things is defined, regardless of physical appearances. In recent centuries this view has been critiqued by many, but the Church has continued to hold that the Real Presence of Christ in the sacrament is a substantial presence according to these categories. 

This is not to deny that there are other perspectives on the Real Presence. Theologians of the Eastern Churches do not, typically, use scholastic categories. For example, they speak of the Real Presence in terms of the eucharistic "Holy Mysteries" which cannot be fully comprehended or defined by the human mind. However, for all that different language and theology is employed, the presence of Christ is no less real in the Mass.

The Creator of the universe who brought us, our world and the cosmos into being from nothing is the same God whose power is effected through the ministry of a Catholic priest to change the substance of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of his Son, Jesus the Christ (Messiah) at the Mass.

Is it any harder to believe in transubstantiation than it is to believe that God created us and the universe from nothing? Is the re-creation of fallen humanity through the sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ any more difficult to believe than God's creation of the universe? 

The Catholic faith in the real presence of Christ can be traced back to the earliest Church Fathers who interpreted St. John as meaning to convey what Jesus said: Eat my flesh, drink my blood, not symbolically but really and truly.

This transformation of bread and wine at the Mass into the reality of Christ is given by God in order that we can be really and truly re-made and incorporated into the real body of Christ. Our bodies and souls are nurtured by consuming with others, at Jesus' own command, not a symbol or some token of remembrance of his body but his actual, real and truly present body.

Blessed John Paul, offers Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament

2.  THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IS 
     THE BODY OF CHRIST

The ecclesiological meaning i.e. the understanding of what the Church is and how it grows organically is sustained and strengthened by the sacraments and is intimately tied to the presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Every Catholic is obligated, as part of the body of Christ, to join with the community of faith at Mass every Sunday and holy day of obligation.

Just as our bodies cannot be sustained without real food and drink, so the Catholic Christian cannot be sustained without the real body and blood of Christ. No pictures or symbols of food will sustain a hungry person and neither can some remembrance or symbolic representation maintain the body and soul of the Christian believer.

Is it any wonder that attendance at mainline Protestant churches in Canada is dwindling where the commitment to an obligation to be at the Eucharist is notional at best?  Catholics have much work to do in the instruction of the faithful and building faith intellectually and morally but there is still a strong adherence to the obligation to celebrate Mass and to respect the real presence of Christ in the celebration and in the sacrament reserved for devotion and adoration.

One only needs to go into a downtown Catholic Church to see hundreds of people daily attending Mass, praying before the Blessed Sacrament or involved in devotions in the respectful silence which is rarely seen in Protestant buildings. In fact, there is a tangible sense of the real presence amongst those who are spiritually sensitive. This reality has often been remarked upon even by unbaptized or uncatechized people -- some of whom are drawn to become part of the Body of Christ by virtue of the silence and reverence found before the real presence of Christ in Catholic churches around the world.

The Blessed Sacrament is truly the Body of Christ presented under the form of Bread 

3.  THE UNIVERSALITY OF THE 
     CATHOLIC FAITH

The presence in Catholic churches of the altar and the tabernacle where the Blessed Sacrament is kept with a light nearby is found around the world. In churches, chapels and cathedrals we find the same devotion to the Body of Christ, another factor in our understanding of the meaning of the real presence for Catholics and indeed for all people.

The structure of the Mass is so universal and well known by the faithful that we find people from all nationalities attending Mass in churches far from their own communities of origin. "Here comes everybody" is the description of the Catholic Church attributed to the famous Irish novelist James Joyce. This universality can be seen particularly in urban churches in every country where people of every race and nation are seen daily at Mass and devotion before the Blessed Sacrament. This is in stark contrast to the national, regional or ethnic divisions in most Protestant sects.

Jesus intended there to be one universal Church, the Body of Christ for the world. Divisions are not part of his will and prayer "that they all may be one" (John 17:21).  The Blessed Sacrament of the one body of Christ not only symbolizes but makes present the reality of the Body of Christ on every continent and island around the world.

These are just three salient points to be made about the teaching and effects of the real presence of Christ for the Church and the world. Of course, the best way to contemplate and enter into this reality is to attend Mass and spend time before the transformative real presence of Jesus Christ. Every city has churches where one can find a quiet place to contemplate the greatest gift of all, the presence of the one true and living God in the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ -- truly and substantially present to you.