Oct 30, 2009 / 01:10 am
The Archbishop Emeritus of Westminster Cormac Murphy-O’Connor has issued an extended commentary on Pope Benedict XVI’s new provision for Anglicans who wish to become Catholic. He reported that a similar proposal had been rejected under Pope John Paul II, but was revived after the “repeated requests” from Anglicans worldwide who have been “knocking at the door for a long time.”
He emphasized that Pope Benedict’s response to those Anglicans who wanted to become Catholic was not a reflection on the Anglican communion as a whole or of Catholics’ ongoing ecumenical relationship with them.
Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor’s comments came during the Richard Stewart Memorial Lecture, delivered at Worth Abbey on Oct. 29. The cardinal was joined at the lecture by the Bishop Kieran Conry of Arundel and Brighton and the Abbot of Worth, Christopher Jamison.
The cardinal, who was the Catholic Co-Chairman of the Anglican/Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC), titled his lecture “ARCIC: Dead in the Water or Money in the Bank.” He recounted his own work in ecumenism from an autobiographical point of view while discussing theological dialogue, the search for communion, and “spiritual ecumenism.”