I had an interesting encounter with a [now] formerly Episcopal Bishop, who ‘swam across the Tiber’ with his wife not many years ago.
He came into the Catholic bookstore where I worked at the time. I waited on him, and as I checked out his purchases, I noticed the chunky ring on his finger (he was wearing civilian clothes, not clericals) and i said innocently,’ Nice ring you got there.’ Much to my mortification, he smiled and said, 'I’m the Episcopal Bishop of ‘______’ . " (I won’t mention the city for privacy reasons). I responded in a small voice, ‘Oh-I apologize, Your Grace.’ He was pretty good about it.
On another occasion when he came in, it was right after Pope Benedict was elected. He told me that he had a great admiration for both Pope John Paul II and then-Cardinal Ratzinger (as men and as intellectuals ‘in the good sense’). He told me that, on the day of Benedict’s election, he was attending a conference of more traditional-minded Episcopal Bishops, priests and laity. He had his cell phone with him, and before he went to the conference, he told his wife to call the minute the conclave in the Sistine Chapel had concluded with the election of a new Pope. In the midst of the meeting, his wife called, said simply the words, ‘Habemus Papam’, and * informed him that Ratzinger was now the Pope! I was so happy to hear that, I impulsively gave the Bishop a ‘high five’ !
And he told me that the other people in the conference stood up and applauded!
Isn’t that cool? And this was five years ago, before the Apostolic Constitution on Anglicans wanting to enter the Church!
After the Bishop retired, he and his wife quietly entered the Catholic Church.*
(which is what I heard our pastor address our archbishop at the Anglican Use Conference years ago—it has a more formal ring to it) instead of Your Excellency (I suppose you can’t go wrong with either)—You Excellency seems to me what you would address secular officials.