The pastor of St. Julian of Norwich Old Catholic Church, the Rev. Father Bernard Sheffield, was installed as Abbot of Order of the Benedictine of the Resurrection, at 7 p.m. Friday in Hope Lutheran Church on Lennard Road. “I think it was a really ecumenical, an Old Catholic Rite in the Lutheran Church,” said Sheffield.
The Right Reverend Joseph Finegan, Bishop of the Old Catholic Church from Tallahassee, will conduct the blessing and Sheffield’s installation.
Neither the Old Catholic Church nor its Benedictine Order are large in the United States, but the order serves a territory from Wisconsin to Massachusetts and south to Florida, Sheffield said.
St. Julian, the local Old Catholic Church, has been in existence less than 10 years and has a small number of parishioners.
The Old Catholic Church began in 1870 when the Pope and his council declared him to be infallible on matters of morals and theology.
A number of German and Dutch churches took issue with the declaration of infallibility and broke away from Rome.
They retained the Catholic Apostolic Succession in which priests and bishops trace their theological lineage back to one of the 12 Apostles of Jesus Christ.
During the turmoil of the Reformation, any church with Catholic in its name suffered under the wave of Protestant Reformation in northern Europe.
The church now titled Old Catholic persevered and when the Roman Catholic Church began to grow in Holland and Germany, adopted the title Old Catholic to differentiate from the followers of Rome.
The church differs from the one headed by the Pope very little in ritual and theology, but has a much more liberal social program that admits women to the priesthood, along with practicing homosexuals, who are barred from the Roman Catholic Church.
It is in communion, meaning its recognizes the rites and orders of the Anglican Church.
Priests and monks from all over the United States were in attendance and participated in the Friday evening ceremonies.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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.
SIC: TCPCOM