OUR CHRISTMAS letter caused some reaction. In it I announced that I had joined "Forward in Faith". I suppose some surprise might have been expected. After all, I had been a member of the founding Committee of "Affirming Catholicism" and I did vote in favour of the ordination of women at the crucial time - and everyone knows that "Forward in Faith" is against women priests isn't it? Had I done an about-turn? I found that I needed to explain myself. The more I thought about explaining myself the more I realised how complicated my reasons were. It then seemed to me that others might also like to read my thoughts and so here they are.
My decision to join "Forward in Faith" does not begin with the ordination of women. In fact I have nothing against women ministering. I was a DDO for nearly fifteen years and I helped many fine women candidates through the system. I hold them in as much respect now as I did then. The story of my decision to join "Forward in Faith" begins elsewhere.
In 1994 I spent several months preparing a Tridentine High Mass using all the old ceremonies and all in Latin, with willing servers and singers, for a "Worship through the Ages" Course in the diocese. I remember clearly thinking to myself that this had to be real, I could never countenance "performing" a mere re-construction. I re-visited my liturgy, my theology and my Latin and when the event took place I inwardly wept with joy. It was a converting experience. I was back home. "They're looking for Catholics to return to the Church" said my wife from the depth of the newspaper. It turned out to be a discreet advert placed by the Catholic Enquiry Centre and it pulled at me.
I had been brought up as an Anglican but as a young man had joined tie Roman Catholic Church and indeed in 1964 had been ordained a priest. I served as a curate in County Durham, then I returned to the Church of England. There have always been times when I have found myself missing belonging to the wider Catholic Church and in the event, singing this Mass was an exceptionally painful episode.
You might ask that if I feel that way, why do I not return? Well, the simple answer is that I do not feel called to. I am quite content in the Church of England. However, I know that as a former Roman Catholic priest there would not be the same welcome awaiting me (if I returned) as is extended to converts. I would be expected to be penitent and I would not be received back as a priest. Rome will have laicised me behind my back. That still leaves me a priest but with no right to minister in the name of the Roman Catholic Church except in emergency. It is the way things are. If I returned, I could not cope with not being an active priest and I do not feel penitent about having ministered as a priest in the Church of England for nearly three decades nor about having married and having a fine family. So, I neither want to leave the Church of England, nor believe I would be welcomed and used as a priest if I did leave. Despite this my wife's comment from the newspaper exacerbated the pain.
It is a real pain. I love the Church of England, yet at the same time I feel the pain of also loving the Roman Catholic Church. The only real solution for me would come if the Church of England united, 'ust as it is, with Rome. The two tug in my heart. My former Bishop, now in retirement, told me he intended to become a Roman Catholic and be ordained. I remembered, almost in a flash, as I wrote to him, the story of the survival of the Roman Catholic Church in this country after the Reformation. My heart thrilled again to its re-emergence from obscurity in the nineteenth century. I recalled reading Newman's great sermon, "The Second Spring". I ached as I reflected that I am no longer part of that story. I totally identified myself with that history when I was a young man.
I miss too the over-flowing love for our Lady that Roman Catholics have (or maybe had). I find the Church of England so grudging in its devotion. Belonging to the Anglican Carmelite Fellowship helps and it is a joy to say the Rosary when we meet, but I do miss belonging to a Church where love for our Lady is normal.
Despite missing these things, I am also far too frustrated with the Roman Catholic Church to return. She has changed since I left in 1968 and some of these changes are welcome, yet the Pope does seem to wear blinkers on some issues that affect ordinary people and ordinary priests. Also, some of the changes surprise me. Where now are the many beautiful choral settings of the Latin liturgy used? Where now is plainsong sung? Where now is the liturgy performed with dignity at the High Altar? I have to forcibly remind myself that probably only in a very select number of Anglican parish churches and some of the Church of England's Cathedrals such as the one in which I serve. (i would be happy to be corrected about this if someone cares to tell me where these things still thrive among Roman Catholics). Returning could be a shock and a disappointment even if I were to think about it.
I am happy in the Church of England to be out of those frustrations. Over the years I have been an Anglican I have never doubted that I was accepted as a priest and I have always believed my position to be tenable. I suppose that if I did think about my position in the Church of England, I always would argue that my integrity in being a (former Roman) Catholic priest ministering in the Church of England relied on an understanding that it is part of the Catholic Church. Without delving into the details, I just took it for granted that political reasons severed Anglicans from the main Church. (There must be many clergy in the Church of England who subscribe to the same view). My reading suggested to me that the general drift of the Oxford Movement under its great nineteenth century leaders made clear that the whole Church of England was part of the Catholic Church. So I found that being a Catholic in the Church of England was normal and acceptable and part of its rich diversity.
Parallel with this I see very positively that the Church of England is a model for what a united Church might be. Here we have all sorts and conditions living together and accepting each other. I had always prayed and worked for unity among Christians but in thinking of the Church of England as a model my idea of unity was Churches coming together (as they are) for Mission, but keeping their own traditions. Surely an admirable model to enable Methodists and Anglicans to draw together. Diversity in unity is still how I think things ought to be. That is how I hope "Forward in Faith" will continue to be accepted. Latterly I also am beginning to see that this is the way to unite in many good activities with peoples of other Faiths.
When I was a Roman Catholic priest I equally wanted unity. The highlight for me was the second Vatican Council which reached out in such a positive way to others. I felt the distance between us Romans and the Anglicans narrowing. Then the Pope pulled in the reins and published the encyclical Humanae Vitae and I left. It was a burden too much laid on the people to whom I ministered.
I did not change much in my outlook when I returned. I had been a bit of a radical as a Roman Catholic priest and I became a bit of a liberal as an Anglican. I still wanted unity among all Christians and after I settled down in the Church of England I found that I could not disown my Catholicism despite swapping churches and there was no need to because I was quite welcome. In both Churches I preached the same theology - Vatican I i. So why do I feel the call to join "Forward in Faith? What has changed?
I have already explained one change, the change in me. From a mildly liberal position, I now have returned to traditional Catholicism in which I was nurtured at Ushaw (the northern seminary). This is where the other change becomes relevant: the Church of England has changed. Some people may think I have been slow to realise it, but I now perceive that it has quietly taken on board a theology of development of doctrinal and moral teaching that is based primarily on contemporary secular thinking. It is giving signs that it wants to cut itself free from its roots in the authority of scripture, the Creeds and the Book of Common Prayer. Moreover, in the Prayer Book the Church of England appears as part of the Catholic Church, but now she seems to have no problem about acting unilaterally. Most publicly, she ignored the rest of the Catholic Church when she opened the priesthood to women. Did she really think she could change, at will, the traditional (and Prayer Book) understanding about who was eligible to receive Catholic Orders, without any reference to Rome (or Orthodoxy, for that matter)?
I confess I did not see it at the time. I respected the women candidates and my assumption was that to open the priesthood to them would be a prophetic act to the wider Catholic Church. So having voted in favour of the ordination of women, for a little while life just carried on. It is true that the public utterances of the Holy Father about the impossibility of women being ordained made me think (i hope he's wrong, time will tell), but until I sang that Mass in 1994 I felt no problem about moving with the changes. After that date I began to think theologically about what was changing.
Porvoo surprised me. The point about the Porvoo negotiations (as I understood them) was the creation of a theology to allow Anglicans to accept the Orders of a Church of the Reformation. It hinged on a new understanding of apostolic succession. Those who defend the Catholicism of the Church of England (for it matters to them) assume that our Bishops are in true apostolic succession by the laying on of hands (despite Apostolicae Curae - but maybe that no longer matters with the repeated involvement of Old Catholic Bishops in Anglican consecrations). The new theology said that what was required was not necessarily a continuity of properly ordained Bishops but only a continuing community of Christians.
It seems to me that the Church of England in signing up to this, has put up a marker about its understanding of the meaning of Holy Orders. One has to ask the same question that was asked by Rome one hundred years ago: When a Church of England Bishop ordains does he intend to ordain to Catholic Orders? I think the Doctrine Commission needs to have a good long hard look at the theology of intention in matters to do with the sacraments. What do we think we are doing?
I reached the point when I knew that I had to do something. Having decided that returning to Rome was not an option for me, I was certainly staying. However I had to be clear about where I stand in this changing Church of England. My long flirting with liberalism died at that Mass in 1994 and I know that I want to affirm traditional Catholic faith and practice. On the other hand, even though I have returned to traditional Catholic values, I am still a bit of a radical. I believe it is perfectly proper to ask radical theological questions of the Catholic Faith within the context of a faithful community of Catholics, but whatever I thought in the past, I cannot now accept that it is acceptable to jettison doctrinal and moral principles as secular reasoning dictates.
Still on my agenda is Christian unity. In this I have not become a reactionary. I am as still convinced as ever I was, that the way to unity is for every integrity to be fully accepted by others. I think the Church of England can still be a good model of unity in diversity. Indeed, how it reacts to the continued presence of "Forward in Faith" in its own structures will be a good test of its commitment to ecumenism.
And that ancient dream of corporate reunion of the Church of England with Rome is still something that moves me. I do believe that there is just enough for Catholics to turn the Church of England back again towards reunion with Rome. Canterbury and York and all they have created need to be sewn again into the mantle of our alma mater.
I also want to proclaim that I enjoy being an Anglican. I admire the Church of England's guardianship of its ancient buildings and the place in which it is held in the nation's life. I respect its history of holy people and holy living. It has a spirituality that being bible based and open to all influences, is rich and forming. It has a liturgical practice that at its best is better than anything currently available in the Roman Catholic Church. I believe it offers a good model for church unity. There is lots that is good about the Church of England.
So I have concluded that in order to be honest to all these things and to stand up for them too, I need to be counted among the members of "Forward in Faith". To those who read our Christmas letter and who commented on my joining "Forward in Faith" I have given to read far more than you bargained for. To others who read this, I have given one malls view which I hope has been interesting.
Michael Banks is Canon Chancellor of Leicester Cathedral