If we can't have clarity, clarification will do + some news updates

 From the Bishop of Ebbsfleet (to those on his mailing list - not in confidence, I hasten to add)
I have had some comments and enquiries about what the Archbishop said on Radio 4 ‘Start the Week’ – and indeed what he meant - with regard to the Ordinariate project. Hostility and lukewarmness have been read into his remarks. Neither reflects his view. I give you here his remarks verbatim and then his domestic chaplain’s interpretation (which is entirely reliable and consistent with what I would have judged him to have meant):
Verbatim
"I think there’ll be a few people who take advantage of it and they’ll take advantage of it because they feel they ought to be in communion with the bishop in Rome; and I can only say, ‘fine, God bless them’. I don’t at the moment and we proceed on that basis and I hope with a level of mutual respect."
Interpretation
That is, ‘God bless those who do feel they ought to be in Communion with the Bishop of Rome now. I don’t feel I ought to be in communion with the Bishop of Rome at the moment - ARCIC and IARCCUM have their long-established agenda here - but we continue our ecumenical journey with mutual respect.’

So - exactly as we thought, no story and no slights whatsoever  intended by the Archbishop of Canterbury (who is far too much of a gentleman - in Newman's true sense - to stoop to that) as regards Anglicanorum Coetibus and those who may wish to take up Pope Benedict's offer. But, Bishop of / in Rome? Hmm...completely accurate in a sense but...... Do modern Archbishops of Canterbury have to refer to Popes in this way, or do they still need to watch their backs? Or am I just being oversensitive here?

However, by far the more interesting question is what future does IARCCUM actually have in the light of recent decisions within the Anglican Communion? Full and visible unity indefinitely deferred? That's precisely our problem - as, without doubt, Archbishop Williams realises.

More Cochereau from Notre Dame for Easter Saturday!



APPEL À LA VÉRITÉ
More for the francophiles among us:
This link via the NLM http://www.andrewcusack.com/2010/04/09/french-appeal/
French Intellectuals Pen ‘Appeal to Truth’ In Support of Benedict XVI
'A number of prominent French men & women have written a ‘call to truth’ supporting Pope Benedict XVI in the current media storm and paedophilia scandal.' I'm not sure about the "sexologist" who has signed though - there really should be some kind of punctuation mark for a gallic shrug.


Not really a "marriage" incentive from the Conservatives, then
from the Daily Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/election-2010/7573263/General-Election-2010-Conservatives-to-give-four-million-married-couples-a-tax-break.html
The Conservatives outline plans to give four million married couples and civil partners an annual £150 tax break.
It would be unrealistic in a secular culture such as ours to expect anything different. But perhaps better than nothing? However, even this is already being dismissed as 'discriminatory' by those who presumably consider that the country should have no interest whatsoever in what remains the basic unit of society, or in the life-style choices people make - except of course where it relates to smoking, over eating, child rearing, carbon consumption etc. etc. etc..  A debate about the limits of legitimate government intervention in our lives would be fascinating in the run up to the General Election on May 6th, but don't expect it - any time soon.

More increasingly desperate attempts to link Pope Benedict personally to a cover-up and a culture of secrecy.
As we know, this will run and run - in Britain, at least until the autumn. Pope Benedict stands for everything the modern media detests (and what's more he is articulate, writes well and is formidably intelligent as well as personally charming, combinations which simply cannnot be allowed in someone who takes a largely conservative line on the things that matter) so he has to be guilty - right? As to the idea of trying to find out the truth; well, - "What is truth? said jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8612787.stm
But see this from an American perspective (thanks to A Conservative Blog for Peace for this link)
http://www.takimag.com/index.php/blogs/article/on_name-stealing_and_misplaced_catholic_anger
This is the extract which struck me most forcibly:
No one’s been more vigorous in cleansing the church of the effects of this sickening sin than this pope, but just because he won’t play ball with the media and the modernists, vile rotweillers like Dowd and Maher, and Dawkins and Hitchens, are taking cheap shots against an institution that will not fight back. "
And this from Damian Thompson:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/damianthompson/100033706/and-so-the-relentless-attempts-to-get-pope-benedict-xvi-continue/
"All that matters to various media outlets is that they beat the opposition to The Story That Brings Down The Pope. And if it doesn’t exist? “Of course it exists!” scream certain editors.
None of this Ratzinger-baiting helps the victims of clerical abuse. In fact, it has helped one or two sleazebag prelates pass the buck. I despair."