THE
P RTAL
August 2017
Page 21
‘Cracking Concrete’
Fr Simon Ellis
F r Simon
Ellis, PP at St Margaret Mary, Birmingham and priest of the Ordinariate of OLW interviews
Fr Vaughn Treco of the Ordinariate of the Chair of St Peter. Fr Vaughn is the Parochial Administrator of
the Church of St Bede the Venerable, a small mission parish near Minneapolis. He recently visited the UK.
1. What has it been like for you all to make the
journey into the Catholic Church and join the
Ordinariate?
of God in the power of the Gospel. If you plot your
course on the assumption that the level of receptivity,
or perceived level or receptivity, is the determining
factor, I think we will become cowards and not
My wife Norma, and our children Cathryn and proclaim the Gospel.
Jaqui, have received a very warm reception both
The Apostle Paul throughout the New Testament
from the clergy and the laity of the Catholic Church
in Minnesota. When I first introduced my wife, they speaks about the Gospel being the power of God: It
were a little startled but definitely they have been can evoke and provoke and generate faith in the hearts
of the hearers.
affectionate and welcoming.
2. When Mgr Jeffry Steenson and Mgr Harry
Entwistle (Ordinary Emeritus of the USA
and Ordinary of the Australian Ordinariate,
respectively) visited the UK in 2015, it was a great
experience for us here. What do you think we can
learn from each other?
I think we have become accustomed as Christians to
think that our power resides in our ability to create a
scenario that people will find attractive. The Apostles
didn’t seem to approach it that way. They would
simply proclaim the Gospel in all of its dimensions,
its demands, moral demands, demands for corrective
thought with regard to God and its demands in terms
of Christian charity to neighbours and our ‘enemies.’
Probably the chief thing we can learn from each
other is in valuing the Anglican Patrimony that we
It has enormous power in and of itself. I think we
have received. We would do well to encourage each
other to hold on to those intangibles of the Anglican would do well to crack concrete — to unadapt Mgr
Patrimony that will make an Ordinariate parish Entwistle’s phrase —with the power of the Gospel.
unique among Catholic parishes. In addition, the
4. No doubt we will retain an affection for Pope
warm welcome of St Bede’s coffee-hour after Mass is
Benedict XVI, who has had a role in this country
not just an addendum; it is part of our life together.
of bringing about a concluding moment for ‘Anglo-
The way Anglican parishes have historically Catholicism’ and its dream of unity of with Rome.
welcomed visitors is another key dimension to that As Benedict turns 90, what is your assessment of his
life. In the USA, the liturgical life of the Ordinariate lasting contribution to the Church and the world?
communities is deeply shaped by, and formed by,
I don’t think we have even begun to see the real
Divine Worship: The Missal. What we have
found in the USA is that the joyful celebration of lasting fruit of Benedict’s pontificate. The Ordinariate
Divine Worship has had a tremendous effect of speaks to a conviction that Benedict had about the
evangelisation, especially for lapsed Catholics when centrality of worship, to the proper formation of the
they see the profound reverence with which Divine people of God and the Church’s ability to do mission.
Worship is celebrated.
In the Ordinariate he was able to give concrete
3. At that meeting in 2015, the vision was very expression to the profoundly reverential nature of
much to see the work of the Ordinariate as one worship, specifically as it speaks to the sacrificial
of evangelisation, but Mgr Entwistle described character of the Mass; it alters both the people of God’s
evangelisation in Australia as ‘like ploughing perception of themselves and their understanding of
concrete.’ Is that your experience i n the USA?
the Gospel, so in the Ordinariate you see this captured
in Divine Worship. The sacrificial character of the
I think a more important aspect to this question Mass is explicit which reorients the people of God,
has to do with the confidence of the priest and people both the ordained and the lay.