Anglicans Coming into the Church, Fr. Chris’ Homily
Homily for the 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B
Restoration seems to be a popular thing nowadays. Whether it’s taking an old car and fixing it up or buying an old house and spending painstaking hours and money to see it as it originally was, there is a human drive towards nostalgia, but this bespeaks a deeper desire: to have things as they once began, perfect, spotless, as they were intended to be.
Restoration is a theme that is constant in the Old Testament as well. Jeremiah brings words of restoration often as he prophecies that God will bring back the remnant of Israel to its home, despite its departure from His covenant, and restore their heritage, but also their spiritual sight allowing them to enter once again with renewed trust into a relationship with God.
This restoration is fulfilled and surpassed in Jesus Christ, whose very ministry was one of calling people back to God, ultimately with salvation.
In the Gospel today, Bartimaeus the blind man cries out to The Son of David to heal his blindness, yet already he has made a statement that his spiritual eyes are quite clear. By calling Jesus “Son of David” he shows that he knows from whom the restoration of his sight will come: The one who was prophesied to bring restoration to Israel: The Messiah-King who would be a descendant of David (which Jesus is), a descendant of Jacob, a descendant of Abraham.
He traces Jesus’ earthly lineage and God’s promise with that one statement and Jesus reveals his divine lineage as Son of God as he heals Bartimaeus’ eyes. This is the faith Jesus affirms when he heals him and commands him to “Go [his] way.” Bartimaeus professes his faith in Jesus in his humanity and in his divinity. Jesus restores Bartimaeus’ sight. Bartimaeus responds by following Jesus, cloak and begging bowl cast aside.
Restoration has also been a theme that our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, has been concerned with, both before and after his election as pope. This past Tuesday, it was announced that Anglicans (those churches who are in doctrinal agreement with the Archbishop of Canterbury – including the Episcopalian Church in the United States) will have the opportunity to enter the Catholic Church.
In his forthcoming Apostolic Constitution, the pope will introduce a new structure within Canon Law that will allow whole parishes or dioceses to convert and align themselves with the Church Christ founded. The document has not yet been released, but the Vatican announced that in this new arrangement, Anglicans would be able retain much of their liturgical and spiritual heritage while being in complete communion with Rome. This is already at work in the United States following the pastoral provision of John Paul II for the United States allowing Episcopalians to enter the Catholic Church, including the ordination of priests who are married in that tradition.
What does this mean?
Immediately it means a next step in Ecumenism has been reached between the Catholic Church and The Anglican Church which has been separated since 1534. While this will not bring an end to total visible and doctrinal separation between Catholics and all Anglicans, it is an important step on the journey.
It means that a bishop will govern all of those who come into the Church within this yet-to-be-formed ordinariate. Usually we think of a diocese as a geographic territory with a bishop as its overseer, who then acts in communion with the bishop of Rome, the pope. What is being proposed is a structure that does not have a set geography, much like the Archbishop of Military Services in the USA is the bishop of all men and women serving in the armed forces all over the world. All those who enter the church would be within this type of “non-territorial” structure.
It means that married Anglican priests will be allowed to continue their ministry, seeking ordination within the Catholic Church. It is important to recognize, though, that celibacy is still a requirement in the Catholic Church for a man to be ordained a bishop. This is true in the 22 other Churches that are in Union with Rome. Presumably, any Anglican bishop who converts to Catholicism may be ordained a priest, but cannot be ordained a bishop if he is married. This is a long-standing tradition of the Church which came into effect shortly after the time of the Apostles and is likely to continue.
It means that many faithful Anglicans who have been upset and disoriented by the recent Anglican ordinations of women bishops and homosexually active bishops will have the opportunity to restore right worship in the manner Christ intended in the Church he pledged to St. Peter would be kept free from harm or error until the end of time.
Ultimately, it means that Christ is restoring a portion of his Church that was lost long ago to a human action of selfishness. Healing is being offered as Christ, through his Vicar, says, “What do you want me to do for you?”
It does not mean that clergy in the Latin Roman Rite will be able to marry. While a manmade discipline, it does as Pope Paul VI states in his encyclical on priestly celibacy:
“support the minister in his exclusive, definitive and total choice of the unique and supreme love of Christ; …uphold him in the entire dedication of himself to the public worship of God and to the service of the Church; …distinguish his state of life both among the faithful and in the world at large.”1
In short, it is a witness unique to the Latin church but not unknown in the Universal church; celibacy has always been held in highest regard, even by Christ himself who was celibate.
It does not mean that women will be admitted to ordination. In fact this new canonical structure means the opposite. The Catholic Church continues to affirm her absolute inability to ordain women. John Paul II writes in an Apostolic Letter concerned with this:
“In calling only men as his Apostles, Christ acted in a completely free and sovereign manner. In doing so, he exercised the same freedom with which, in all his behavior, he emphasized the dignity and the vocation of women, without conforming to the prevailing customs and to the traditions sanctioned by the legislation of the time.”2
Indeed the vocation of women in the Church will continue to be realized in the plan set forth by Christ as he founded the Church according to the example of Mary, not ordained as a ministerial priest, but very much a woman whose ministry to the early Church and to the first priest-Apostles showed her (and all women) to be equal in dignity to them (and likewise to all men).
And what does all this mean for us? What is Jesus saying to you and me today by bringing this event about within our lifetime?
Jesus speaks to us as he did to Bartimaeus. “What do you want me to do for you?” He looks into our hearts and sees the spiritual blindness that keeps us from him. He sees the issues within our Church that do not reflect His Eternal plan for our salvation. He stops, calls us, bids us throw everything aside and come to him through the Church he founded, in the manner that has been upheld by those chosen to guard the Christ’s Church for over 2000 years.
For our part, we must do as Bartimaeus had done before Jesus entered his town. We must be willing to see Jesus for who he is: the one promised us from God so many ages ago. He is the one who can bring us closer to the Father than we can do on our own power. He is the one who can bring clarity from the confusion of voices in our modern culture. He is the one who brings fulfillment if we seek His Will alone with our whole heart.
He is the one to whom we cry in our blindness: “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me.”
He is the one who restores.
Footnotes
1 SACERDOTALIS CAELIBATUS, 14.
2 ORDINATIO SACERDOTALIS, 2.
, Bud McFarlane, Jr.
