Traditional Anglican Community Wants Unity

[Orionthehunter]

I find this thread very interesting as it shows the friction between the big picture of bringing home separated breathren (their clergy and their flock) vs. the short-term dilemma of precedent or percieved waffling on a fundamental discipline.

Is this an option: Because these former RC clergy were validly ordained (inviolable Mark) and it is their marriage that was illicit, the Church could deny them priestly faculties upon readmission, allow them to validate their vows of marriage, and give them faculties equal to a permanent deacon?

Secondly, we have a priest shortage. Essentially faculties of priest and deacon differ on two major areas: Consecrating the Eucharist/Presiding at Mass and Confession. Otherwise, Deacon’s can do anything else a Priest can do including being an Administor (not Pastor) of a parish. The Confession is easily handled by just going down the street to the Catholic Church on Saturday afternoons. But the Mass issue is not. Is it an option to allow them to have an expanded Communion Service in lieu of Mass as an interim liturgy (based on either the Anglican or Catholic liturgy), have that fulfill Sunday Mass obligation until they have sufficient ordinations from within their tradition or RC priests are assigned to their parish.

I bump to see if anyone knows the answers? Andreas? Father Serpa? Brother Rich?

 

[otjm]

I find this thread very interesting as it shows the friction between the big picture of bringing home separated breathren (their clergy and their flock) vs. the short-term dilemma of precedent or percieved waffling on a fundamental discipline.

Is this an option: Because these former RC clergy were validly ordained (inviolable Mark) and it is their marriage that was illicit, the Church could deny them priestly faculties upon readmission, allow them to validate their vows of marriage, and give them faculties equal to a permanent deacon?\QUOTE]Depending on the circumstances, their marriage may or may not be licit; that would depend on whether they were laicized by Rome and granted permission to marry (it is my understanding that the two are not necessarily synonymous but ususally occur together). If they were, and then went to the Anglican, I doubt anything would change if they were to come back; that is, they would be a laicized inividual. The likelyhood of Rome recognizing a “lower” or perhaps better said, different level of ordination I would guess to be as likely as a hot place freezing over. There have been a few priests who have been laicized, married, their wife died, and they returned to the priesthood. anything else just doesn’t seem in the realm of possiblities.
Orionthehunter;2887874:

Secondly, we have a priest shortage. Essentially faculties of priest and deacon differ on two major areas: Consecrating the Eucharist/Presiding at Mass and Confession. Otherwise, Deacon’s can do anything else a Priest can do including being an Administor (not Pastor) of a parish. The Confession is easily handled by just going down the street to the Catholic Church on Saturday afternoons. But the Mass issue is not. Is it an option to allow them to have an expanded Communion Service in lieu of Mass as an interim liturgy (based on either the Anglican or Catholic liturgy), have that fulfill Sunday Mass obligation until they have sufficient ordinations from within their tradition or RC priests are assigned to their parish.

Again, I would not think it likely; there is too much danger of confusion, to begin with; and I just don’t see it likely that someone who was ordained, left and continued to act as a priest coming back and settling for a position as deacon. There is also the issue of how the congregation would react. One would guess not overwhelingly in favor. Most likely they would either have their own rite modified by their own priest (and not one who was Catholic previously), or they would be blended into a local parish.

 

[Andreas_Hofer]

I am perplexed…

I cannot find anything to verify this figure of 400,000.

If (as I suspect) the average parish membership is around 500 persons it would require 800 parishes and pastors. That seems very unrealistic to me.

Now I can see that some parishes might have 2,000 to 5,000 active members, but that is extraordinary in the United States even in the Episcopal church (TEC). How many TAC parishes would be so large?

I don’t see it.

Michael

I was just going off of what Chatter pointed out are their own figures. Since I knew it was supposedly a worldwide communion, I didn’t think I was in a position to judge the veracity based only on my experience of the US (especially with the impression that Africa and Asia are far more conservative than the West). But if those numbers are inflated, feel free to amend them. I still think we’re dealing with a different beast than letting in one parish at a time in a provision that, by its own terms (which may no longer reflect reality) seems meant to die with the priest.

 

[Andreas_Hofer]

I find this thread very interesting as it shows the friction between the big picture of bringing home separated breathren (their clergy and their flock) vs. the short-term dilemma of precedent or percieved waffling on a fundamental discipline.

Is this an option: Because these former RC clergy were validly ordained (inviolable Mark) and it is their marriage that was illicit, the Church could deny them priestly faculties upon readmission, allow them to validate their vows of marriage, and give them faculties equal to a permanent deacon?

Secondly, we have a priest shortage. Essentially faculties of priest and deacon differ on two major areas: Consecrating the Eucharist/Presiding at Mass and Confession. Otherwise, Deacon’s can do anything else a Priest can do including being an Administor (not Pastor) of a parish. The Confession is easily handled by just going down the street to the Catholic Church on Saturday afternoons. But the Mass issue is not. Is it an option to allow them to have an expanded Communion Service in lieu of Mass as an interim liturgy (based on either the Anglican or Catholic liturgy), have that fulfill Sunday Mass obligation until they have sufficient ordinations from within their tradition or RC priests are assigned to their parish.

Those who have lost the clerical state can only be reinstated by the Apostolic See. That goes to show that even if we’re talking about internal matters the expectation is that it will receive close scrutiny on a case-by-case basis. Typically those sorts of reserved favors are, I think we can all agree, not often granted.

This goes to answer your hypothetically allowing them to function as deacons upon readmission: I don’t see allowing them to function as deacons being at all likely (I’m not even sure if it’s at all juridically sound, i.e. if we have a legal category for that sort of restriction) because deacons are clerics, too. It’s the same sort of hurdle, essentially, as being readmitted as a priest.

Also, bringing someone back into the priesthood who has shown himself ready to break his vows is always going to give a bishop pause. I don’t think there are any Eastern bishops (who have no problem with married clergy) who wouldn’t also at least put in some serious thought before receiving that sort of person as a priest. Perhaps Michael could tell us what he remembers as the rule of thumb among Eastern Catholic hierarchs. It’s a very weighty issue, and you have to make very sure you won’t get burned again. So there are even considerations that go beyond simply protecting the venerable tradition of our church sui iuris from abuse - it’s a simple prudential judgment as well. There is a principle in law that basically runs “once a liar, always a liar.” If a man has run out on his obligations before God and man before, we need to overturn that presumption before readmitting him to service.

 

[AJV]

Secondly, we have a priest shortage. Essentially faculties of priest and deacon differ on two major areas: Consecrating the Eucharist/Presiding at Mass and Confession. Otherwise, Deacon’s can do anything else a Priest can do including being an Administor (not Pastor) of a parish. The Confession is easily handled by just going down the street to the Catholic Church on Saturday afternoons. But the Mass issue is not. Is it an option to allow them to have an expanded Communion Service in lieu of Mass as an interim liturgy (based on either the Anglican or Catholic liturgy), have that fulfill Sunday Mass obligation until they have sufficient ordinations from within their tradition or RC priests are assigned to their parish.

Could this be unlikely for another reason. If the Anglicans are able to go to the RC church down the street for Confession, surely they are able to present themselves for the Mass? To replace the Sacrifice, the supreme act of worship of the the Church, with a glorified Communion service as the main Sunday worship for those returning creates the wrong impression and seems quite illogical to me on many levels, not least the graces that people will be deprived of (and even more so if they have not been able to confess and so cannot receive Communion).

 

[Orionthehunter]

Those who have lost the clerical state can only be reinstated by the Apostolic See. That goes to show that even if we’re talking about internal matters the expectation is that it will receive close scrutiny on a case-by-case basis. Typically those sorts of reserved favors are, I think we can all agree, not often granted.

This goes to answer your hypothetically allowing them to function as deacons upon readmission: I don’t see allowing them to function as deacons being at all likely (I’m not even sure if it’s at all juridically sound, i.e. if we have a legal category for that sort of restriction) because deacons are clerics, too. It’s the same sort of hurdle, essentially, as being readmitted as a priest.

Also, bringing someone back into the priesthood who has shown himself ready to break his vows is always going to give a bishop pause. I don’t think there are any Eastern bishops (who have no problem with married clergy) who wouldn’t also at least put in some serious thought before receiving that sort of person as a priest. Perhaps Michael could tell us what he remembers as the rule of thumb among Eastern Catholic hierarchs. It’s a very weighty issue, and you have to make very sure you won’t get burned again. So there are even considerations that go beyond simply protecting the venerable tradition of our church sui iuris from abuse - it’s a simple prudential judgment as well. There is a principle in law that basically runs “once a liar, always a liar.” If a man has run out on his obligations before God and man before, we need to overturn that presumption before readmitting him to service.

Good answer. That is why hypotheticals are usually stupid questions. I guess the issue isn’t that interesting. Like all things, the Church will deal with all who come back to the Church correctly for the benefit of the Church, the laity, and the clergy.

 

[ASimpleSinner]

Perhaps Michael could tell us what he remembers as the rule of thumb among Eastern Catholic hierarchs.

I am not Michael, but I am Greek Catholic… Some people seem to be of the mistaken impression - not saying you are one - that because we are self-governed or have married priests that Latins can get married and then join us. Simply NOT the case. We don’t always even take back our own guys who leave the Greek Catholic Church as laymen, and then get ordained by the Orthodox. We certainly CANNOT take Latin priests who contract marriage into our church. It is against tradition AND Rome would have a fit (and rightly so).

 

[Andreas_Hofer]

I am not Michael, but I am Greek Catholic… Some people seem to be of the mistaken impression - not saying you are one - that because we are self-governed or have married priests that Latins can get married and then join us. Simply NOT the case. We don’t always even take back our own guys who leave the Greek Catholic Church as laymen, and then get ordained by the Orthodox. We certainly CANNOT take Latin priests who contract marriage into our church. It is against tradition AND Rome would have a fit (and rightly so).

Thanks for your (name removed by moderator)ut. I would have said as much but, not being from one of those churches, didn’t want to put words in anyone’s mouth. I was hoping to show that this was more than a matter of, to put it pejoratively, the Latins simply guarding their precious celibacy at all costs, so wanted to bring out that everyone is going to be a little leery of ex-Romans returning.

 

[Aramis]

I bump to see if anyone knows the answers? Andreas? Father Serpa? Brother Rich?

I’ve not checked the Latin Canons, but the answer to devolving priests to deacons is a tentative “No.”

Deacons are still clerics, and their clerical state was still lost, and deacons lose the clerical state when they contract marriage, even if done licitly with permission from the Pope.

One of my dad’s class of deacons was widowed, and granted permission to remarry… after laicization.

 

[ASimpleSinner]

Thanks for your (name removed by moderator)ut. I would have said as much but, not being from one of those churches, didn’t want to put words in anyone’s mouth. I was hoping to show that this was more than a matter of, to put it pejoratively, the Latins simply guarding their precious celibacy at all costs, so wanted to bring out that everyone is going to be a little leery of ex-Romans returning.

“the Latins simply guarding their precious celibacy at all costs, so wanted to bring out that everyone is going to be a little leery of ex-Romans returning.”

Not only partisan but harsh. I had come to expect better from you. Something must be off today.

Not that it has NEVER happened ever (exceptions to every rule) but by and large the canonical Orthodox would not allow a man from another national church with impediments from one sacrament to recieve another. They Greeks would not take a widowed priest from the Russians and allow him to remarry. The Romanians would not take a monk from the Antiochians in as a priest if he had left vows and gotten married.

It used to even be that some Orthodox would not take in ex-Latins who had contracted marriage post-ordination. Now its rather routine

So I think that your comment casts the current (and ancient) praxis it in the wrong light.

Being that we are in total communion with the Holy See, and they with us, it would be a total slap in the face to undermine the dignity and order of the other’s disciplines in such a matter.

 

[Andreas_Hofer]

“the Latins simply guarding their precious celibacy at all costs, so wanted to bring out that everyone is going to be a little leery of ex-Romans returning.”

Not only partisan but harsh. I had come to expect better from you. Something must be off today.

Not that it has NEVER happened ever (exceptions to every rule) but by and large the canonical Orthodox would not allow a man from another national church with impediments from one sacrament to recieve another. They Greeks would not take a widowed priest from the Russians and allow him to remarry. The Romanians would not take a monk from the Antiochians in as a priest if he had left vows and gotten married.

It used to even be that some Orthodox would not take in ex-Latins who had contracted marriage post-ordination. Now its rather routine

So I think that your comment casts the current (and ancient) praxis it in the wrong light.

Being that we are in total communion with the Holy See, and they with us, it would be a total slap in the face to undermine the dignity and order of the other’s disciplines in such a matter.

Slow down, now, I wasn’t trying to say anyone was making accusations, or to be partisan. I actually pointed out that I was trying to put that phrase in a pejorative formulation, and my intent by expressing it that way was to say that even if someone were to radicalize this comment (which I am not saying was meant to cast aspersions):

I find this thread very interesting as it shows the friction between the big picture of bringing home separated breathren (their clergy and their flock) vs. the short-term dilemma of precedent or percieved waffling on a fundamental discipline.

that the question is larger than precedents and celibacy and can’t be reduced to a dichotomy of “receive converts” vs. “protect celibacy.” In other words, there are going to be issues that everyone would consider regardless of positions on celibacy. (For instance, as you already said, you think long and hard before taking back one of your own who has been ordained Orthodox - that’s regardless of questions of marriage.)

I apologize if you heard much more than this, especially if you thought I was implying the Eastern Churches would connive toward undermining Latin discipline or would be sneering at that discipline. I suppose it’s one of those things that seemed harmless when you said it but then you wish had never come out of your mouth.