The Ordinariate in 2018 . . . continued from page 8
THE P RTAL
April 2018 Page 21
The Ordinariate in 2018 . . . continued from page 8
because they will be attracted by the sort of worship and passion of community life we have with each other and that is happening all over the country .”
We turned to negatives and disappointments over the past year . Mgr Keith said , “ We haven ’ t got very much further with having buildings put into our care , though there are some hopeful signs for the future . Whether they come to anything , I ’ m not sure . I think it is important to have some buildings , I don ’ t expect the diocese to give me a church . Real estate costs a lot in England , but a church can be dedicated to the life of the Ordinariate . It ’ s not just where a priest looks after a church and has a little group who are either assimilated into the life of a parish , or has a small Ordinariate mass using Divine Worship at some inconvenient time on a Sunday afternoon .
Mass at Our Lady of the Assumption , Warwick Street , London
“ I think what is a lot more hopeful in the future , is having a parish dedicated to the mission of the Ordinariate , like this parish of Our Lady of the Assumption here in Warwick Street .
“ The only commitment we have here is to have one Novus Ordo mass on a Sunday and one on holy days of obligation . This means everything else , including the Triduum , baptisms and so forth , can be according to Divine Worship . You can actually have a shop window , if you like , of what we are . This is very important , if we are to share gifts you should not put the gifts in a box were people can ’ t see them . They have to be in open and able to be seen and experienced by people . They are not going to be experienced at four o ’ clock on a Sunday afternoon .”
As to the language used for worship , Mgr Keith said , “ There is an interesting conversation going on
in the Church here about the translation of the missal and what will happen in the future . The Bishops ’ Conference has said the new rules about translation are not retroactive so we can ’ t go back . Some people will complain about the language of the new Roman Missal and say it ’ s not normal language for everyday life but we have to realise we have lots of different languages that we use in our society .
“ The language we use in court is not the same language we use in the local pub . You do not speak to the Queen in the same way you speak to your best mate . When you talk about things spiritual , language is taken to extreme in to express things that are almost impossible to express in human language . Sometimes it will be the job of the priest to explain the language of the Missal to congregations ; words like consubstantial . If people were brought up Anglican they would have come across this word quite a lot in hymnody .
Looking forward this coming year we have an ordination for eight men at the Birmingham Oratory and that will be conducted by the Archbishop of Birmingham . We have our first Pastoral Conference for laity . The Pastoral Council , which has met twice a year , is a group of laity which represents our groups around Scotland , England and Wales . This is something that the other two ordinariates have been unable to do because of the enormous distances involved . Our Pastoral Council has planned a conference for laity for August , which I hope will be a great success . There will be very few clergy there ; just me , a chaplain and the Deans will drop in for a short time .
“ One of the things we discussed in Australia this year is the fact that the Apostolic Constitution will be ten years old in November 2019 . We are planning a symposium in Rome to celebrate that . There will be celebrations of Mass around Rome and the opportunity to listen to eminent speakers . I have already had a letter from the Prefect of the CDF , which has obviously taken this very seriously and are looking for some suggestions , so they will be behind the actual symposium , which is very encouraging .”
Finally , I said , “ The last thing that I wrote down was that in a conversation you had with Jackie and me , you flew a kite about what the Ordinariate was for . You said that a lot of people inside and outside the Ordinariate have ideas – and they are not the same ideas . Very few of them are what the Vatican thinks the Ordinariate is for , and I wondered it you wanted to take the opportunity to say something about this .”