.- Ten years in the past immediately, Msgr. Keith Newton was getting ready to be ordained a Catholic priest at Westminster Cathedral, the mom church of Catholics in England and Wales. It could be an ordination like no different.
The date was Jan. 15, 2011. Up till Dec. 31, Newton had been an Anglican bishop. The following day, he was acquired into the Catholic Church. On Jan. 13, he was ordained a deacon. Now, he was about to turn into a Catholic priest.
However not solely that: on the ordination ceremony he could be appointed to supervise a completely new construction inside the Catholic Church: the Private Ordinariate of Our Girl of Walsingham.
On the eve of the tenth anniversary of the ordinariate’s creation, Newton recalled that he was requested to maintain his ordination date a secret till after he was acquired. He apprehensive that nobody could be current for the ceremony, at which two different former Anglican bishops — John Broadhurst and Andrew Burnham — would even be ordained as Catholic monks. It turned out that Newton was fairly incorrect.
“The cathedral was completely packed to the doorways,” he mentioned in a Jan. 14 interview with CNA. “It was at our ordination Mass {that a} letter was learn out from Cardinal Levada [the then prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith], asserting that the Holy Father had appointed me because the Extraordinary.”
“And the ordinariate was erected with the title of Our Girl of Walsingham — and no person knew that beforehand.”
Newton, a 68-year-old Liverpudlian, described the day as “fairly emotional.”
“The thrill was palpable. There have been lots of people who had come to the Mass who have been going to return with us, who have been nonetheless Anglicans however have been hoping to be acquired ultimately. And there have been a lot of native Catholics as nicely,” he mentioned.
The then Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster started his homily with the phrases: “Many ordinations have taken place on this cathedral through the 100 years of its historical past. However none fairly like this.”
“This was a historic second,” Newton mirrored, “not solely as a result of we have been three serving bishops — different Anglican bishops had been beforehand acquired into the total communion of the Catholic Church — however as a result of we have been being acquired into this new construction which Pope Benedict had arrange which allowed you not simply to turn into a Catholic however truly to convey one thing that had nurtured you within the religion into the Common Church.”
Benedict XVI had licensed the creation of private ordinariates for teams of former Anglicans in his 2009 apostolic constitution “Anglicanorum coetibus.”
The Private Ordinariate of Our Girl of Walsingham, overlaying England, Wales, and Scotland, was the primary to be established. It was adopted by the Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter, for the US and Canada, on Jan. 1, 2012, and the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of the Southern Cross, for Australia and Asia, on June 15, 2012.
As Newton is married and has three kids, he was unable to be ordained as a Catholic bishop. However this was no impediment to his appointment as an Extraordinary.
“To all intents and functions it’s like being the bishop,” he defined. “The one issues I can’t do {that a} bishop can do is to ordain individuals to the diaconate and the priesthood and to consecrate the chrism.”
“My jurisdiction is barely totally different in that it’s not fast. It’s vicarious on behalf of the Roman pontiff. However I’m an equal member, as an Extraordinary, of the bishops’ convention of England and Wales.”
Like a bishop, he can put on a miter. However he identified that the miter shouldn’t be, in actual fact, reserved for bishops.
“Miters and crosiers aren’t indicators of being a bishop. They’re truly indicators of jurisdiction. Abbots put on miters and carry crosiers,” he mentioned.
“I’m an Extraordinary as a result of an Extraordinary is an individual who has jurisdiction over an entity. Within the Church of England, as an illustration, an Extraordinary doesn’t even need to be a priest as a result of at Westminster Abbey the Extraordinary is the Queen.”
Newton spent the primary 58 years of his life as an Anglican. Born in 1952, he was ordained as a Church of England clergyman in 1976. Within the latter half of the Eighties, he served because the Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral in Blantyre, Malawi. In 2002, the archbishop of Canterbury ordained him as an Anglican bishop.
These experiences ready him to tackle the problem of launching a brand new construction within the Catholic Church with minimal assets.
“It was beginning off from completely nothing,” he mentioned. “The primary six months have been taken up with getting ready laity and monks for reception into the Catholic Church, which befell round about Easter of that yr, 2011.”
“After which the preparation for clergy to be ordained later in the summertime. They had a crash course, from Ash Wednesday till their ordination. After which after that, there was a two-year course of of continuous formation. However they have been ordained early in order that they may pastor the teams they introduced in. That was the entire concept.”
On the similar time, Newton had to make sure that former Anglican clergy ordained as Catholic monks had somebody to dwell and one thing to dwell on. Regardless of fashionable notions in regards to the huge wealth of the Catholic Church, Catholicism in England, a minimum of, operates on a shoestring.
“That was a terrific headache within the first few months, to be sure that everyone had adequate cash to dwell on and someplace truly to dwell,” he mentioned. “However it all labored out ultimately.”
In its first 10 years, the ordinariate has grown in some locations and “withered away” in others, Newton mentioned. The group has a church in London, the place Newton is predicated, and another in Torbay, Cornwall. However the ordinariate doesn’t have the cash to buy different church buildings of its personal throughout Britain.
“So what’s occurred over the ten years is that we’ve began to work extra with native dioceses in operating parishes on behalf of the diocese in addition to the native ordinariate group,” Newton famous.
“There are about 25 or 30 parishes in England and Wales that we’re the parish monks of on behalf of the diocesan bishop. This offers a approach of financing and a spot for them to dwell.”
The ordinariate has its personal authorised liturgy, incorporating the sonorous prayers of Thomas Cranmer, the primary Protestant archbishop of Canterbury. However Lots in parishes run by ordinariate monks aren’t all the time celebrated in keeping with the Ordinariate Use.
Ever for the reason that ordinariate’s creation, critics have accused it of being “top-heavy” with clergy. Newton mentioned that was a good criticism, however identified that ordinariate monks serve not solely ex-Anglicans but additionally the broader Catholic group by means of the parishes.
One other widespread criticism is that the ordinariate has failed to draw the variety of Catholic-minded Anglicans that it was anticipated to 10 years in the past. Once more, Newton accepted that there was some fact to this.
“In the event you take a look at the Church of England, in all probability many Church of England individuals simply adopted what their native parish did and didn’t actually have the form of deep emotions about union with the Catholic Church that most of the monks had,” he mirrored.
As an Anglican drawn to the Catholic religion, Newton felt annoyed that Catholic-Anglican dialogue didn’t seem like resulting in better unity between the 2 communions.
“In truth, not solely was it not coming to something, however the distance between the Catholic Church and Anglican Church simply gave the impression to be getting bigger fairly than smaller,” he mentioned.
“So when the Holy Father, Pope Benedict, revealed the apostolic structure, it was for us a solution to prayer. It was the achievement of our hopes that we might be in union with the Holy See and but nonetheless honor the background which had nurtured us within the Christian religion.”
Newton famous that ordinariate members have been “barely nervous” when Benedict XVI resigned in 2013, simply two years after founding the ordinariate. Would his successor take the identical curiosity within the new construction?
Newton mentioned that Pope Francis turned out to be an “encouraging” determine, though there have been few Anglicans in his native Argentina.
“He’s promoted a missal for us. He’s modified a few of our norms to enlarge our mission. So it continues in the identical approach, actually. It’s a part of the Catholic Church now. It’s a constituent half, a construction which belongs to it,” he mentioned.
“We nonetheless relate to the Holy Father by means of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Religion they usually’re nonetheless very supportive.”
The ordinariate acquired a morale enhance in October 2019, when the pope canonized John Henry Newman.
“To see Newman’s picture above some St. Peter’s Sq., an individual who — fairly extra dramatically than us, I think about — had additionally been an Anglican clergyman and made the journey to full communion, to be canonized as a saint was a tremendous expertise. And naturally he’s additionally our patron, in order that’s additionally doubly necessary for us.”
Newton mentioned that for the reason that canonization extra Anglican clergy had contacted the ordinariate inquiring about the potential of changing into Catholic monks.
“They’ve been youthful monks fairly than older ones,” he mentioned.
The coronavirus disaster has pressured the ordinariate to place its tenth anniversary celebrations on maintain, although Newton will have a good time a Solemn Mass and Te Deum on Jan. 16, livestreamed from the ordinariate’s London church at midday native time.
The ordinariate has set out its imaginative and prescient for the years forward within the doc “Our Calling and Our Mission.” It focuses on strengthening the ordinariate’s communal life, vocations and formation, and evangelization.
Newton believes that the ordinariate could make a particular contribution to the “new evangelization,” a time period popularized by Pope John Paul II.
“I believe we will all the time remind the Catholic Church that evangelization is much more than merely getting lapsed Catholics again to church,” he mentioned. “Usually that’s the form of language we hear when truly the Nice Fee is to exit to everyone.”
“And in our nation, you’ve many individuals who’ve obtained no religion, or have lapsed from any observe of the religion, and our evangelization is about all of them.”
“And I believe that’s one of many issues that former Anglicans perceive. Once we have been Anglican monks, we had a ministry to the entire parish, not simply to the congregation. And I believe that’s a side of evangelization that we must maintain in entrance of individuals.”
