Monday 5 January 2009

In the bleak midwinter

Having ended our celebrations of the Epiphany here with a solemn mass and a BBC radio recording from a freezingly cold Parish Church (even with the heating on full blast), now is perhaps a good time to take stock of our situation. It is almost four months since we heard the news of the removal of provision for alternative episcopal oversight in the Church in Wales. If anything should warn our Catholic brethren in the Church of England against the acceptance of a Code of Practice, this should be it. We had a code of practice giving us a Provincial Assistant Bishop and they took the provision away from us overnight.
Many have been praying for a change of heart on the part of the Bishops, but correspondence we received from the Archbishop of Wales before Christmas makes that change of heart seem highly improbable, to say the least.
Essentially, there will be a change of heart “when hell freezes over."
There are many things one could say about the Archbishop’s letter, it’s probably best simply to repeat a comment made by a member of the P.C.C. – “So much for pastoral care!”
The question for Anglican Catholics in Wales is where does this leave us?
Is it all over?
Where do we go from here?

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