Searching for God # 102

 On the eve of Dame Sarah Mullally’s installation as the first female Archbishop of Canterbury, the Vatican has released a major doctrinal text defining “Anglican heritage” as lived in the Catholic Church’s personal ordinariates—and declaring it a permanent, missionary gift to Catholic life, not a temporary halfway house. 

The document, “Characteristics of the Anglican Heritage as Lived in the Ordinariates Established Under the Apostolic Constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus,” sets out seven hallmarks of this patrimony—consultative church life, evangelization through beauty, daily common prayer, care for the poor, family as “domestic church,” Scripture‑rich preaching, and serious spiritual direction and confession—and insists that these are to be safeguarded and shared as a “living reality” for the future.

The text was published on 24 March 2026, just as global media converged on Canterbury for Mullally’s historic installation on 25 March, the Feast of the Annunciation. For Anglo-Catholics, the juxtaposition is hard to miss: while the Church of England celebrates a contested innovation in orders and leadership, Rome quietly offers a detailed, appreciative account of classic Anglican spirituality as it understands and receives it—within the doctrinal and sacramental framework of the Catholic Church. 

The timing underlines three contrasting trajectories: a Canterbury-centered Anglicanism re‑shaping its identity under a new archbishop, a confessional Anglicanism centered on the dynamic churches of the global south, and an Anglican patrimony that Rome says has found a stable home in the ordinariates.

A defined and permanent patrimony

The new text, issued by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, is the fruit of a March plenary meeting in Rome with the three ordinaries of the personal ordinariates. It asks what exactly has been brought into Catholic life from Anglicanism and how that heritage is now being lived. The answers are strikingly positive. Drawing on earlier papal language that spoke of a “worthy patrimony of piety and usage” and “a precious gift … and a treasure to be shared,” the document insists that there is a recognisable core identity across ordinariate communities worldwide, despite their spread from the UK and North America to Australia and beyond.

That identity is rooted in a common journey: clergy and laity who first encountered the Gospel within Anglicanism and later entered full communion with Rome, bringing with them certain spiritual, liturgical and pastoral instincts. Far from treating these as relics that will fade in a generation, the dicastery states plainly that this patrimony is a “living reality” ordered to handing on the faith to future generations. It explicitly rejects the idea that the ordinariates are a merely transitional structure, instead presenting them as a settled, enduring “face” of the Catholic Church with their own contribution to make.

 

First, the document describes a distinctive ecclesial ethos: a church life that is highly relational, with strong lay–clerical collaboration and a habit of consultation. This is not presented as congregationalism, but as a style of governance and pastoral care which assumes that faithful laity share responsibility for the Church’s life and mission.

Second, it highlights “evangelization through beauty.” Here Rome speaks warmly of reverent liturgy, ordered ceremonial, a rich musical tradition, and a strong sense of sacred space—not as aesthetic self‑indulgence, but as a way of drawing people into the mystery of Christ. The assumption is clear: what many would call “high church” worship is a missionary asset, not an embarrassment.

Third, the bishops underline “direct outreach to the poor” as integral to this patrimony. Beauty at the altar is expected to spill over into concrete service in the streets. The document points to the example of St John Henry Newman, whose theological stature never obscured his work among the poor of Birmingham, as emblematic of this Anglican‑formed, deeply incarnational instinct.

Fourth, it describes a pastoral culture shaped by the Divine Office. The daily rhythm of Morning and Evening Prayer—refined over centuries in the Book of Common Prayer—is presented as a key part of the ordinariates’ life, now in Catholic form. The office is not the preserve of clergy in choir stalls, but the prayer of the whole people of God, anchoring parish life in Scripture and intercession.

Fifth, the family is described as the “domestic church,” with particular attention given to Walsingham as “England’s Nazareth.” The home is seen as the first school of the Gospel, and ordinariate parishes are urged to support parents as primary educators in the faith, fostering an “organic” approach to formation that links altar, font, and family table.

Sixth, the document points to a tradition of Scripture‑grounded preaching. Sermons are expected to be biblically rich, intellectually serious, and pastorally applied—nourishing minds as well as hearts. The text explicitly connects this with engagement with the Fathers and the wider Catholic tradition, and with a high view of reason serving faith.

Seventh, it identifies a particular style of cura animarum in spiritual direction and confession. The ordinariates, drawing on Anglican pastoral habits, are said to give time to individual souls, accompanying them patiently to an encounter with Christ the Good Shepherd in the sacrament of reconciliation and in ongoing spiritual counsel.

All of this is explicitly located in a robust Christology: the Incarnation, Passion and Resurrection of the Son of God are presented as the source from which the dignity of the person, the meaning of beauty, the shape of liturgy, the call to serve the poor, and the vocation of the family all flow.

From Anglican Ink, by George Conger, March 27, 2026, in a piece entitled Vatican fires a shot across Mulally’s bow

Patrimony: inherited from the Father

Ordinariates: Canonical structures within the Roman Catholic Church, equivalent to dioceses, created to allow groups of former Anglicans to enter into full communion with the Catholic Church while retaining elements of their Anglican liturgical and spiritual heritage. Established by Pope Benedict XVI in 2009.

Anglicanorum ceotibus: an apostolic constitution issued by Pope Benedict XVI November 4, 2009

Contested innovation in orders and leadership: the disputed ordination of women and in some diocese, the ordination of gays and lesbians

St. John Henry Newman: English Catholic theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer and poet, ordained as an Anglican Deacon (1824) and Anglican priest (2025) and later a Catholic priest (1847), and later a Cardinal (1879). He belonged to the Church of England from 1824-1845, and the Catholic church from 1845-90.

Walsingham: home to major Catholic and Anglican shrines in Norther England, concerned with the incarnation of Jesus and the belief that Jesus was born of a woman in a particular place, into a human family.

Cura animarum: care of the souls or cure of the souls, the fundamental pastoral responsibility of the clergy, linked to concepts such as pastoral care, spiritual direction and soul care.

The document is historic for a number of reasons. It attempts to envision, and to invite and to propose a reunification of the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches which split apart under the Act of Supremacy, 1534, enacted under Henry V111. The church was briefly united with Rome from 1553-1558 under the reign of Mary 1, but separated again under Eizabeth 1, 1558-1603. The Elizabethan Religious Settlement established the Church of England as a conservative Protestant church. During this time, the Book of Common Prayer was authorized as the church’s official liturgy and the Thirty-nine Articles as a doctrinal statement. These continue to be important expressions of Anglicanism (Wikipedia)

The issue of an exclusive male clergy, however, represents a significant divide, as well as the marriage and ordination of LGBTQ+ persons. In a previous post, I included a summary of William Blake’s interpretation of the Original Fall, as a separation of male and female, from a previous androgynous state, similar to the androgyny of God. That divide currently not only separates the Church of England from the Roman Catholic church; it also has generated another divide between the Church of England and GAFCON, the group of former Anglicans who hold that any other sexual orientation except male and female is counter to scripture.

From hrc.org, Human Rights Campaign, we read:

….(W)hat Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 17:17-18) indicates experience should inform how we learn God’s truth. This was what allowed the Christians to decide to include gentiles who were not keeping the Old Testament law in the early church. (Acts 15:1-19). It also was the basis for the Christian arguments that put an end to slavery and has supported movements for women’s equality throughout church history as well. The call to reform Christian teaching in these instances didn’t suggest that human experience should be held over Scripture. What they did suggest was that the obvious exclusion, injustice and destructive outcomes of widely held beliefs should take Christians back to the text to consider a different perspective, one which might better reflect the heart of God. While some Christians say that the Bible presents a variety of hard teachings as well as promising suffering of followers of Jesus (Matthew 16:24), it never endorses oppression. In order for suffering to be Christ-like, it must be redemptive. Redemptive suffering does not uphold oppressive forces but always expresses resistance to them. For all these reasons and more, Christians have a moral imperative to reconsider their interpretation of what the Bible says about LGBTQ+ identities.

The question of whether Christian theology is and can or must remain ‘fixed’ as in the patterns mentioned in the ‘seven principles’ above, or be amenable to experience, and open to the shifting tides and winds of time, history, learning, and especially the poetic imagination also lies at the heart of the Vatican document. Of course, opening an informal, yet public, negotiation, really another form of evangelism (recruitment, ecclesial growth and social and political status), especially at a time of extraordinary turbulence in geopolitics, globalization, environmental protection, genetic discoveries,  a digital and cyber revolution, a revolution in the manner of conducting warfare….and….and…..exploding prices and costs for everyday families….a form and face of ‘stasis’ represents a lifeguard’s rescue ring for those who feel they are drowning in chaos and powerlessness.

Nevertheless, Blake, and the Human Rights Campaign are not the only sources of both insight and theological reflection that might be worthy of consideration.

As originator and participant in the Jesus Seminar,  Robert W, Funk in his book, Honest to Jesus writes in a chapter entitled, ‘Jesus for a New Age’….

The ‘new age’ refers first and foremost to the end of Christianized era….I am not thereby claiming that Christianity has come to an end; I am only proposing that the Christianized West can no longer pretend to sponsor the only game on planet earth….

In the global arena, the symbolic world that is ingredient to traditional Christianity no longer occupies a foundational position…..The advent of a new age has brought with it the chance to star over…There is nothing in the creed, in the gospels in Christian tradition and in the historical and scientific methodologies with which we study them that is immune to critical assessment and reformation…..In the ‘new age,’ all theology is post-Auschwitz, as a German theologian recently remarked. Theology conducted in the aftermath of Auschwitz means, among other things, that we can no longer trust the authority structure of an ecclesiastical tradition that learned, at several critical junctures in its history it was unable to resist the ultimate compromise. We should already have learned that from the lessons of the Spanish Inquisition. Or we might have gathered something of the American cpropensity to read scripture in a self-serving was as an endorsement of black slavery…(Also) People are beginning to talk—openly, intelligently, candidly, without rancor-about the Bible, the gospels in particular, and about the Christian faith, its past and its future. (Funk, op, cit. pps 297-298-299)

Funk actually proposes specific ideas for consideration, some twenty-one theses in answer to the question:

What real knowledge—knowledge of consequence for us and out time—has this thirst to know the flesh-and-blood Jesus produced? What difference could it possible make? (Funk, op. cit, p, 3000)

To be continued………