A TRUMPET fanfare announced the arrival of the new Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster on Ascension Day, as he came to take possession of his archiepiscopal sedia.On the stroke of noon on Thursday last week, the tall west doors opened, and the congregation saw outlined in the entrance the processional cross, below which the Archbishop knelt at the threshold in prayer.
Then the Most Revd Vincent Nichols, aged 63, the former Archbishop of Birmingham, came in.
It was a ceremony of new gold vestments, 16th-century plainsong, and original music by James MacMillan, all interspersed with moments of gentleness and humour.
The congregation, already seated for an hour, had followed the Offices of Lauds and Terce.
We had seen the “ecumenical and interfaith guests” — archbishops and bishops of the Orthodox and Coptic churches, a scattering of Anglican and Free Church clerics, a Sikh, a Buddhist, a Muslim, and a Jew — take their seats in the body of the church.
The co-presidents of Churches Together in England were given places of honour in the cathedral, but not everyone in this ecumenical service had a walk-on part.
“Those not in full communion with the Roman Catholic Church” were welcome to receive a blessing, we were told in the service book of the votive mass of St Paul the Apostle.
The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of York did not take up the invitation, a press officer said.
The Apostolic Nuncio read out the Apostolic Letter of authority from Pope Benedict XVI, naming “his venerable Brother Vincent Gerard Nichols” as Metropolitan Archbishop of Westminster.
The Chapter read the letter, and then the Provost, saying, “In the name of God. Amen. By his authority . . .”, installed him on the throne.
Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor handed his crozier to him with “prayerful confidence and trust”, as “a sign of the shepherd’s office”.
Dr Williams stepped forward to welcome him in his new position as a fellow co-president of Churches Together in England.
“In recent years, the relations between the Churches in this country have become closer and warmer than perhaps ever before,” Dr Williams said.
“The Roman Catholic and Anglican communities in England and Wales have the God-given task, along with all our other brothers and sisters in the faith, of making the Good News of Jesus compelling and attractive to a generation deeply in need of hope and meaning — in need of something they can trust with all their hearts.
“Dear Vincent, I hope that as you join us as a co-president of the Churches Together in England we may work together at this task, as I had the privilege and delight of working with your predecessor, who was and is such a friend and example to us all. Be sure of the love and prayers of all your colleagues in the churches of England and Wales, as you take up the yoke of Christ in this fresh ministry.”
In his sermon, Archbishop Nichols called for a society “in which we genuinely listen to each other, in which sincere disagreement is not made out to be insult or harassment, in which reasoned principles are not construed as prejudice, and in which we attribute to each other the best, and not the worst, of motives”.
The media had an important part to play in this, he said.
The previous evening, on ITV’s News at Ten, the Archbishop had given an interview about the publication of a 2600-page report on child abuse by Roman Catholic religious orders in the Irish Republic.
The next day, newspapers reported that child-protection groups were outraged at his remark that it took “courage” for “those in reli-gious orders, and some of the clergy” to “face these facts from their past”.
As the service drew to a close, Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor confessed to having one “small” ambition: all the previous incumbents had died in office, and he had hoped not to.
Now, in the words of Simeon in the Nunc Dimittis, he could go in peace.
But it would, he said, be “a bit over the top to say ‘Now mine eyes have seen my salvation’”.
There were battles to be won and lost to sustain the Christian presence in a secular society, he said.
The most crucial thing was to be delivered from all evil, as in the Lord’s Prayer.
The evil that was “uppermost in Jesus’s mind”, he felt, “was the loss of faith”.
Despite the daunting task ahead, the new Archbishop need have no fears, the Cardinal said, because he would not be alone.
The prayers of all the faithful would be with him.
“This is the day that the Lord has made: let us be glad and rejoice with him.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Disclaimer
No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to us or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.
The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that we agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.
Source (CT)
SV (ED)