Today being a Sunday, Iâm late responding to this one.
I see what youâre getting at (especially in light of recent replies here).
Yes, I will agree that
Apostolicae Curae would apply to that moment in time, and to events before that time. Naturally, it would only apply to future (from Pope Leo XIIIâs perspective) ordination ceremonies if nothing were to happen to cause the situation to change.
So, did that âsomething happenâ? Did Anglicanism has some kind of ârestoration of valid orders?â
First, let us keep in mind that lineage itself is not sufficient for Apostolic Succession. A ordained B ordained C⌠is a starting point, but is not the final criteria for determining validity. If this were the case,
Apostolicae Curae would never have happened. No one doubts the historical reality that Anglican attempts at ordination can be traced back to the Catholic bishops before Henry VIII.
The obvious response to that question then seems to be that yes, something did happen, that being the fact that the so-called âOld Catholicâ bishops participated in Anglican ordination ceremonies, especially episcopal ordination ceremonies, and that therefore Apostolic Succession was âre-introducedâ into Anglicanism. This may seem at first to be an obvious answer but I donât believe the conclusion is so clear when we look into it further.
To start with, in order to have Apostolic Succession re-introduced into Anglicanism, we would first have to show that Anglicanism itself saw the need for such a restoration. In other words, we would have to see the events (ordinations by Old Catholics) as being corrective from the perspective of Anglicanismâan admission by Anglicanism that its orders had been invalid and therefore needed the âDutch touchâ to be once again valid. Needless to say, so such thing happened. Instead, the presence of Old Catholic bishops was more coincidental than it was essential. Anglicanism hardly stopped their attempted ordinations until each candidate for bishop had been ordained by an Old Catholic or a successor.
This means that Anglicanism itself did not see the Bonn Agreement as something that fundamentally changed Anglican orders. If that were the case, then candidates for Anglican bishop would first have been ordained priests by the Old Catholic bishopsâof course this didnât happen. They certainly did not re-ordain priests and bishops after Bonn.
That brings us back to the beginning. Lineage itself is not sufficient. Proper form is also required (Iâll accept as a given that the corrected Anglican ordinals have proper form in the strictest sense). Intent too is required. So what then was the intent of Anglican bishops to ordain bishops and priests after the Bonn Agreement? The answer of course is that it was the same after as it was before. The intent since Bonn has been to ordain ministers to the exact same offices as before Bonn. The problem though is that those âsame officesâ are not valid sacramental orders but ones which are absolutely null and utterly void.
Pope Leo taught that the intent to pass along the priesthood (in the fullest Catholic sense) was not just incidental but necessary for Apostolic Succession. Since there was doubt (indeed outright denial by Anglicans at the time of Edward II) that the office of priest was one of offering the Holy Sacrifice, and this doubt invalidated their orders, we can apply the same criteria to the 20th century. The intent of Anglican âbishopsâ was not to have a restored episcopate/priesthood, but to continue as they had always done. Unfortunately, to continue as they had always done means continuing in invalid attempts at ordination.
In short, nothing has happened since Pope Leoâs Bull in 1896 to cause a change in the intent of Anglican attempts at ordination.
Continuing the question âwhat is the intent?â there are certainly other problems of intent that cannot be ignored. Anglicanism as a worldwide whole accepts as âvalidâ ordinations of Lutherans and Methodists (just to name 2 obvious ones). Episcopalian Anglicanism accepts as âvalidâ just about any denominationâs attempts at ordination.*
By accepting just about any ceremony as a âvalidâ ordination that necessarily means that the standard employed by Anglicans (at least in the US) is a very broad one. Given that Anglicans are willing to say âLutherans, Methodists, et al. have the same ordination that we doâ it only seems natural for Catholics to respond in agreement. Only the Catholic response is more along the lines of âyour ordinations are no more valid than theirs.â
Remember, this is about âintent.â Anglicans have the intent to pass along Anglican orders as they have always been, in contrast to an intent to pass along a valid, Apostolic Succession.
Finally, we cannot fail to notice that Anglicanism (at least the majority of them, and certainly in their official positions) believe that their orders are open to women. Therefore an Anglican âbishopâ who ordains someone is ordaining him (or her!) to an office that is completely incompatible with the Priesthood as established by Jesus Christ. Since a lack of intent to ordain to the priesthood of Sacrifice was enough to invalidate Anglican attempted orders in 1896, surely in 2012 the lack of intent to ordain to an all-male priesthood is sufficient to prove lack-of-valid-intent.
This last part does not meant to imply that if Anglicans today accept the Divine Law of an all-male priesthood somehow their intent is sufficient. Instead, the other factors would also apply.
Anyway, Iâve spent so much time surfing for references here that I think Iâve lost my train of thought from the very beginning. If Iâve missed something or someone feels that some particular issue should be addressed more, by all means post away. I havenât intentionally neglected to respond here, Iâm just getting distracted.
So, am I right to think that only the Anglican Use Catholics are really Catholic in their beliefs and they are the ones that are joining our faith? If so then I think I got it!!
