The Anglo-Catholic

A Brief Introduction and Rationale

by Christian Campbell

I am the Senior Warden of the Cathedral of the Incarnation (Orlando, FL) and a member of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Church in America’s Diocese of the Eastern United States. The ACA is the American province of the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC).

I enter the world of blogging only reluctantly. Though I have followed the Anglo-Catholic and traditionalist Roman Catholic blogosphere closely for a number of years, my participation has always been limited to that of a spectator. A lay leader in my Anglican parish and diocese, it has been helpful to keep abreast both of developments in sister jurisdictions of the so-called “Continuing Church” and ecumenical developments with other Catholic groups — but I have always been wary of entering the fray. The pitched battles waged in the comment boxes of weblogs rarely prove productive. The unhappy divisions in the Anglican Continuum have made for a digital minefield that has hardly seemed worth treading, and, as an Anglican, I have generally felt it presumptuous to publicly comment on Roman Catholic sites. Moreover, my leadership role in the Church requires a certain discretion and, until now, there has never been a reason for me to complicate matters by mounting an online soapbox.

In October of 2007, the House of Bishops of the Traditional Anglican Communion petitioned the Holy See for a provision which would allow the TAC — corporately — to enter full communion with the Roman Catholic Church. Similar appeals were made by other Anglican groups, most notably Forward in Faith UK.

On November 9, 2009, the Holy Father answered the prayers of generations of Anglican Catholics with the publication of the Apostolic Constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus which provides for canonical structures allowing Anglican groups to enter full communion with the Catholic Church while preserving elements of the distinctive Anglican spiritual and liturgical patrimony...  Read the whole article.