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MARCH 23 2012 THE CATHOLIC HERALD

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Church praises Anglican leader

BY ED WEST

ARCHBISHOP Vincent Nichols of Westminster has paid tribute to Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, after it was announced that he was stepping down in December to become Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge.

Archbishop Nichols said: “In the last three years I have grown to appreciate more and more the fine qualities of Archbishop Rowan: his kindness, his sharp intellect, his dedication to striving for harmony between peoples, especially within the Christian family, his courage and his friendship. These will be much missed when he steps down from his demanding office in December. I will miss him.”

Dr Williams announced last Friday that he will step down after 10 years of leading the troubled Anglican Communion.

During his time in office Dr Williams attended the funeral of Blessed Pope John Paul II, the first Archbishop of Canterbury to attend a funeral of a pope since the Reformation. He also attended the inauguration of Pope Benedict XVI and the two men have had warm relations, as was evident during the papal visit in September 2010, when the two led a service together at Westminster Abbey.

Mgr Keith Newton, head of the Personal Ordinariate, paid tribute to a man who, he said, had tried to hold the Church together.

He said: “The Anglican Communion will miss him, he is an inspirational person, and a very spiritual one. Personally he has always been very courteous to me and to everyone in the ordinariate.

“It’s a very difficult job to hold the Communion together. I think it’s difficult because if you take a firm line in anything people fall out. His strategy is to keep people talking everyone around.

“It is a gruelling job being Archbishop of Canterbury. You’re always available to people, and they often think he has more authority. In reality he has very little area to manoeuvre. He kept the Lambeth Conference to

Dr Rowan Williams and Pope Benedict XVI embrace during a prayer service at Westminster Abbey PA photo gether in 2008 through sheer force of his holiness,” Mgr Newton said. “Relations with the Catholic Church depend on the individual Archbishop of Canterbury. I don’t think ecumenical relations would have got any further under any other archbishop. And his personal relations with Pope Benedict are extremely cordial,” he said.

Born in 1950 near Swansea to a Welsh-speaking family who had converted from Presbyterianism, Dr Williams studied theology at Christ’s College, Cambridge,

and received his DPhil from Oxford. He was elected as Bishop of Monmouth in 1991 and Archbishop of Wales in 1999, leading the disestablished Welsh Anglican church that separated from the Church of England in 1920. He therefore became the first Archbishop of Canterbury since Cardinal Pole to be appointed from outside the Church of England, when he became the 104th man to hold that position. At 52 he was the youngest Archbishop of Canterbury in nearly 200 years, with children living at

Lambeth Palace for the first time in 130 years.

Regarded as an AngloCatholic, Dr Williams had once considered crossing the Tiber and has written on St Teresa of Avila. He is also a patron of Affirming Catholicism, the liberal AngloCatholic movement within the Church of England, a member of the AngloCatholic Jubilee Group, and has contributed to a book of essays to mark the 150th anniversary of the Oxford Movement called Essays Catholic and Radical.

Politically on the Left, while chaplain of Clare College, Cambridge, he was arrested on a Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament demonstration at Lakenheath. Last year he guest edited the New Statesman, writing an editorial that was highly critical of the Government’s welfare reforms.

Dr Williams supported women’s ordination and is thought to hold liberal views on homosexuality, the most divisive issue in the Church. Charterhouse: Page 20

IRELAND’S bishops have called for the establishment of a new government post with specific responsibility for the increasing number of Irish emigrants forced overseas due to the recession.

The chairman of the Irish Episcopal Council for Emigrants, Bishop John Kirby of Clonfert, made the call as he launched a new emigration information pack in Dublin last week.

Bishop Kirby said he was saddened that involuntary emigration was “a feature once again in the narrative of the Irish nation”.

“Ireland is currently experiencing a poverty that is both hard to calculate and articulate” and within this

Irish bishops ask for minister for emigrants BY SARAH MACDONALD

“painful context”, he said, it was no exaggeration to say that “the scourge of emigration affects every Irish family”.

Unemployment fell from 18 per cent in the mid-1980s to 4.5 per cent in 2007 and is now back up to 14.6 per cent, according to the Irish Central Statistics Office. In what became known as the Celtic Tiger years, the economy of the Irish Republic expanded at an average rate of 9.4 per cent between 1995 and 2000 and continued to grow at an average rate of 5.5 per cent during the following decade until 2008, when it fell into recession.

At the height of the Celtic Tiger years 10 per cent of the Irish population were non-Irish nationals, primarily East Europeans who came seeking jobs in the building sector and service industries.

Ireland had a population of 4.6 million in 2011. Latest figures show that between April 2010 and April 2011, 76,400 people emigrated from the Irish Republic and 40,200 of them were Irish nationals. That is an increase of 45 per cent on the number of Irish nationals who emigrated in 2010.

Demanding a “tangible political response” to this “forced emigration”, Bishop Kirby also called on the government to use St Patrick’s Day for Irish government ministers overseas to meet emigrants. He said that such a gesture would remind people at home of the plight of Irish emigrants and assure emigrants of support for them at home.

Bishop Kirby told the American Catholic News Service of several incidents that illustrate the issue. He said that, in February, a Gaelic Athletic Association team in County Kerry lost 14 team members to emigration.

He also told of an annual festival in Buncrana, County Donegal, that was cancelled after 40 years because “19 of the 44 who were responsible for organising it are now gone”.

Fr Alan Hilliard, who has worked in Irish chaplaincies in Australia and America, said: “The issue for us today is that migration is now forced. In the Celtic Tiger days, when things were good here, there was still emigration, but that was because people chose to go.

“It is different today. The vast majority of people are going because there is no hope... there is nothing here.”

“The push factors are very high at the moment in terms of there being no jobs. Little hope is being offered about the future. For those who have gone abroad, they are happy to be where they are, but they are not happy to have had to leave Ireland in the first place.”

Fr Hilliard said that three types of people are emigrating. One group includes young families – fathers, mothers and their children, something he called “a new phenomenon”. Another group is individuals looking for a job and the third is made up of those who just decide to go because there is nothing in Ireland for them.

WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL

MACMILLAN SEVEN LAST WORDS

FROM THE CROSS

Westminster Cathedral Choir & Strings directed by Martin Baker leader Nicholas Miller Wednesday 28 March 2012 at 7.30pm Tickets £15, available from The Cathedral Gift Shop and Ticketmaster Tel 0870 154 4040 Web www.ticketmaster.co.uk

Visitors call for better formation of Irish clergy Ex-civil servant appointed as head of safeguarding

Continued from Page 1 “more consistent admission criteria” and a more thorough examination of a candidate’s suitability for the priesthood; and child protection education as a part of seminarians’ academic studies.

In regard to religious institutes, the Vatican recommended that bishops lead a “process of renewing dialogue and concrete collaboration in the field of safeguarding children, while also seeking to bring about a more effective and deeper communion” among the different religious orders.

The orders also “should perform an audit of their personnel files” and regularly monitor their implementation of national child protection norms.

Bishops, religious superiors and members of the board for safeguarding children should continue to update policies on dealing with priests and religious falsely accused of abuse, dealing with suspected abusers when civil authorities decline to prosecute and determining where and under what conditions convicted offenders should live.

Benedict XVI ordered the visitation in response to an abuse crisis which Irish government reports said had gone on for decades within a “culture of secrecy”.

The investigation, which began in November 2010 and ended last spring, was not meant to deal with past or present allegations, but to monitor how anti-abuse guidelines established in 2009 by the Irish Church were being followed, and how effective they had proven.

At a press conference in Dublin Cardinal Seán Brady of Armagh, said: “In expressing true sorrow and regret, we make our own the heartfelt plea for forgiveness from the victims, and from God, for these terrible crimes and sins.” He also praised the fact that the report notes the “continuing vitality of the Irish people’s faith... the human and spiritual bonds among the faithful at a time of crisis... the exemplary way in which many priests and religious live out their vocation and... [the] remarkable level of lay involvement in the structures of child protection” within the Church.

The abuse victims’ support group One in Four criticised the report, insisting that “the Vatican is still not accepting responsibility for its role in creating the culture of purposeful cover-ups of the sexual abuse of children”.

Visitors included Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, Cardinal Seán O’Malley of Boston, Cardinal Thomas Collins of Toronto and Archbishop Terrence Prendergast of Ottawa. Cardinal Timothy Dolan, New York, led the visitation to seminaries.

BY ED WEST

A NEW CHAIRMAN of the National Catholic Safeguarding Commission (NCSC) has been appointed following the resignation of Baroness Scotland.

Danny Sullivan, the new chairman, is a former director of education for the Anglican Diocese of Oxford and senior civil servant in the Ministry of Justice.

He was appointed after Baroness Patricia Scotland resigned from the role in December because of the pressures of other work commitments.

Mr Sullivan has worked as a primary headteacher, teacher trainer and schools adviser before becoming director of education for the Diocese of Oxford with responsibility for 280 schools. On top of this he provides leadership and management training for headteachers and teachers and has also published works on children’s spirituality.

He is also responsible for a number of teams serving London’s Crown and Magistrates’ Courts. He is currently on a two-year contract, working one day a week for the Ministry of Justice and Foreign Office, coordinating a programme of judicial cooperation between Britain and Algeria. He is also a Hampshire magistrate sitting in the family and criminal courts.

He retired from the Diocese of Oxford in 2008 but has continued to work as a consultant.

A Catholic, he is also a member of the Thomas Merton Society of Great Britain and Ireland and former chairman of the society. His wife and three adult children all work in the health sector.

Mr Sullivan said: “I am delighted to be taking up the role of chair of the NCSC. I value the independence the Church affords to the role of the Commission and recognise how vital that is. The Church continues to make progress in safeguarding, but there is no room for complacency as we move forward to create a safe environment within the Church for all children, young people and vulnerable adults.

“The Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, makes clear that safeguarding and particularly the ongoing dialogue and work with and for survivors should be at the core of our mission as Church and I am passionately committed to ensuring that this will continue to be championed by the Commission.”

The NCSC was established in July 2008 following the recommendations in the Cumberlege Report “Safeguarding with Confidence”.

NEWSBULLETIN One million ʻfaith cardsʼ are handed out in parishes CARDS for Catholics are now being distributed throughout 24 dioceses in England and Wales.

the exercise is not too costly.

The card says that the carrier is Catholic and states six things that Catholics are called to do.

A spokeswoman for the bishops’ conference of England and Wales said the cards were being distributed gradually over the next month to make sure

She said there had been inquiries about the cards from 12 countries, including America, Sweden and Australia.

Additional cards are also being distributed through the Catholic Education Service, prison chaplaincy, Caritas Social Action Network and the Flame Youth Congress.

Assad is suspended from order SYRIAN President Bashar al-Assad has been suspended from the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of St George.

The move was made last week just before Italian foreign minister and Constantinian Order knight Giulio Terzi di Sant’Agata, reaffirmed “the strongest condemnation of the unacceptable violence by the Syrian regime against its own citizens”.

Over 7,000 people have been killed in the year-long crackdown by Assad’s Ba’athist regime.

The order presented the award in 2004 to the Syrian president, then regarded as a reformer in the oppressive but secular state.

Anthony Bailey, the order’s delegate for Great Britain and Ireland, urged all knights and dames of the order to pray for an immediate end to violence in Syria.

Columnist to speak at abbey CATHOLIC HERALD columnist Fr Ronald Rolheiser is to speak at a theology festival at Buckfast Abbey, Somerset, in July.

Fr Rolheiser, based in San Antonio, Texas, will speak alongside other theologians, priests, an abbot and a bishop at the four-day festival on July 14 to 17. Another Herald contributor, Scripture scholar Dom Henry Wansbrough, will also be giving a talk.

First layman to run Oxford hall FOR THE first time a layman has been appointed as Master of St Benet’s Hall, a Permanent Private Hall at Oxford University run by Benedictines. Werner Jeanrond, a theologian, is currently Professor of Divinity at Glasgow University and in 2008 was the first Catholic to take up a theology professorship in Sweden. He will start his role at St Benet’s in September.

Quarter of a million sign petition JUST OVER a quarter of a million people have signed the Coalition for Marriage petition opposing the redefinition of marriage to include same-sex couples.

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Pope offers indulgence for opening of shrine church

BY MADELEINE TEAHAN

Sunday by Mgr Giles Wach, the founder of the institute, and Bishop Mark Davies of Shrewsbury will preach.

under the usual conditions (sacramental Confession, Eucharistic Communion and Prayer for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff).

delighted that the Holy Father has given his blessing to this historic occasion. Such an honour is befitting the reopening of a church building which has stood as a beacon of faith on the Wirral peninsular for so many years.”

Catholic doctrine holds that when a person is forgiven their sins there still remains a “temporal punishment” or debt due to those sins. This may be undertaken by offering up penance and the sufferings of this life. According to Church teaching, that which still remains at death will need to be completed in Purgatory.

Save Our Unique Landmark (Soul), said that the news had heartened his soul and strengthened his faith. He said: “My colleagues and I have striven since May 2007 to keep open this iconic church. We still have not achieved the vernacular Mass at weekends yet and will continue to campaign for this.

It said: “The Apostolic Penitentiary, empowered by a faculty granted to it in a special way by our Holy Father Benedict XVI, by Divine Providence Pope, happily grants his Lordship the Most Reverend Mark Davies, Bishop of Shrewsbury, that, on the March 24 next, on which the pastoral care of the Church of Ss Peter and Paul and St Philomena is solemnly entrusted to the members of the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, after the offering of the Divine Sacrifice, he may impart to all the faithful present, who, their souls entirely separated from attachment to sin, take part in the sacred mysteries, a Papal Blessing with an attached Plenary Indulgence, which may be gained

BENEDICT XVI is offering a papal blessing with an attached plenary indulgence to those who attend the opening of the first shrine church in England dedicated to the Extraordinary Form.

People are expected to travel from different parts of the country and some from overseas to the shrine church.

The shrine church of Ss Peter and Paul and St Philomena in New Brighton, Wirral, will open tomorrow, Saturday March 24, following the closure of the parish church in 2008.

The church will become the first in Britain to be entrusted to the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, a society of Apostolic life of Pontifical Right.

The Mass to mark the Church’s re-opening will be celebrated on

Bishop Davies said: “It is a source of great joy that we have received the blessing of the Holy Father and a plenary indulgence to mark the new mission of this historic church of the Shrewsbury diocese.”

The Vatican, which has taken an interest in the establishment of the shrine church, has issued the decree announcing the papal blessing and plenary indulgence to all the faithful who attend the Mass.

Court: same-sex marriage is not a human right

“Those faithful unable for a reasonable cause to be present at the sacred rites may devoutly receive this Papal Blessing and the Plenary Indulgence, according to the norms, if they follow the rites with a pious intention of mind by means of radio or television broadcast. Nothing to the contrary withstanding.”

A plenary indulgence, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, is “closely linked to the Sacrament of Penance”, and is the remission of the punishment due to sins whose guilt has been forgiven.

On this special occasion the plenary indulgence applies to Catholics who are free from mortal sin and who attend the opening of the shrine church of Ss Peter and Paul and St Philomena, receive Holy Communion and go to Confession within seven days and who pray for the intentions of the Pope.

Frank McGowan, chairman of

“I am delighted that his Holiness has granted the attendees at the opening of the shrine the privilege of a plenary indulgence and his blessing.

“That heartens my soul and strenghens my faith which has been tested at times over these last years.”

Paul Hayes, who is a Conservative councillor, said: “I am

The church will be dedicated to the promotion of the Blessed Sacrament and the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite.

Canon Oliver Meney, who is Sovereign Priest at the shrine church, said that, following the re-opening of a church, five families have already indicated that they hope to move closer to the church because of its dedication to the traditional Latin Mass. Feature: Page 9

Church leaders mark 25 years since founding of Welsh diocese

BY SIMON CALDWELL

THERE are no human rights to either gay marriage or gay adoption, senior European judges have ruled.

The European Court of Human Rights threw out an attempt by a French lesbian couple to recognise their rights to marriage and to adopt a daughter.

Seven judges decided that under the European Convention on Human Rights there was no right to homosexual marriage.

They also upheld French law forbidding both gay marriage and gay adoption on the grounds that it was consistent with the established understanding of human rights and that it did not discriminate on grounds of sexual orientation.

The ruling represents a victory for Nicholas Sarkozy, the President of France and an EU leader who is resolutely opposed to gay marriage and adoption of children by gays.

But it also marks a blow to David Cameron’s deeply unpopular intentions to redefine the meaning of marriage so it includes samesex couples.

The Prime Minister is already facing fierce criticism from rank-and-file Conservative Party members and from the churches for threatening to impose legislation on the country which was not included in any manifesto and for which there is no demand from the public.

The ruling by the European Court will add to claims that there is no legal justification for the controversial proposed legislation unveiled by the Coalition Government last week.

Norman Wells of the Family and Education Trust said the ruling was “very welcome”.

He said: “For too long campaigners have been using the language of rights in an attempt to add moral force to what are nothing more than personal desires, and in many cases they have bypassed the democratic process and succeeded in imposing their views on the rest of the population by force of law.

“We are seeing the same principle at work in the Government’s sham of a consultation on same-sex marriage,’ he said.

“Less than two years ago none of the major political parties considered this such a vital issue of equality and social justice that they saw fit to include it in their election manifesto.

“Yet now, the Government has signalled that it is determined to force a new definition of marriage on to the statute books regardless of what the public thinks.

“Hopefully this week’s ruling from the European Court of Human Rights will embolden those whose concerns about same-sex marriage and adoption are not inspired by personal hatred and animosity, but by a genuine concern for the well-being of children and the welfare of society.”

The case was brought by Valerie Gas and Nathalie Dubois who were seeking to jointly adopt a child the latter had conceived through artificial insemination.

French law forbids unmarried couples from jointly adopting a child and it also prevents gay people from marrying.

The court ruled that French law on adoption did not discriminate on the grounds of sexual orientation because it was applied equally to gay and straight couples.

It found that there is no “indirect discrimination founded... on the impossibility of marriage” because article 12 of the European Convention “does not impose on the governments of the state parties the obligation to open marriage to a homosexual couple”.

Bishop Burns of Menevia celebrates Mass to mark the 25th anniversary of his diocese with the apostolic nuncio to Britain Photo: Paul McSherry

BISHOP THOMAS BURNS of Menevia was joined by cardinals, bishops and the apostolic nuncio to Britain on Monday as he marked the 25th anniversary of his diocese.

The Mass at the Cathedral Church of St Joseph, Swansea, was also intended to celebrate Bishop Burns’s 40th anniversary as a priest and his 10th as a bishop.

A message from the Pope was read out by the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Antonio Mennini and the homily was preached by Abbot Paul Stonham OSB of nearby Belmont Abbey. Both Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, Emeritus Archbishop of Westminster, and Cardinal Keith O’Brien, Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, spoke at the end of the

Mass. Cardinal O’Brien congratulated Wales as the “nation of the Grand Slam” and indicated that he was speaking on behalf of Scotland, “nation of the wooden spoon”.

He cited the words of St David, Welsh patron saint, quoted by Pope Benedict XVI and addressed to the people of Wales when he was in Britain 18 months ago.

These words were simply: “Be joyful, keep the faith and do the little things.”

The cardinal said that the congregation, not only Bishop Burns, but each and every Catholic in Wales, should keep these words of their patron saint often before their mind and see in the practice of their Christian faith a deeply felt joy.

Muslim council backs Church in marriage debate BY MADELEINE TEAHAN

THE LEADER of the Muslim Council for Britain (MCB) has backed the Catholic Church’s response to the legalisation of same-sex marriage.

Farooq Murad, Secretary General of the MCB, said: “Whilst we remain opposed to all forms of discrimination, including homophobia, redefining the meaning of marriage is in our opinion unnecessary and unhelpful.

“With the advent of civil partnerships, both homosexual and heterosexual couples now have equal rights in the eyes of the law.

“Therefore, in our view the case to change the definition of marriage, as accepted throughout time and across cultures, is strikingly weak.”

lesbians and we are delighted that there is a Civil Partnership Act. We believe that this gives gays and lesbians everything they need.”

The Government is now in the process of consulting on how a change to the definition of marriage would be brought about.

In an article for the Sunday Telegraph earlier this month, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, wrote: “As an institution, marriage long predates the existence of any state or government. It was not created by governments and should not be changed by them. Instead, recognising the innumerable benefits which marriage brings to society, they should act to protect and uphold marriage, not attack or dismantle it.”

In common with other Abrahamic faiths, marriage in Islam is defined as “a union between a man and a woman”, he said. “So while the state has accommodated for gay couples, such unions will not be blessed as marriage by the Islamic institutions”.

The leader of Britain’s Sikh’s community, Lord Singh, head of the Network of Sikh Organisations, also said that the Government’s proposals were “a sideways assault on religion.”

“It is an attempt by a vocal, secular minority to attack religion,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

He continued: “We have total respect for gays and

Cardinal O’Brien described the Government’s reassurances that churches will not be forced to marry gay people as “staggeringly arrogant”.

He continued: “No government has the moral authority to dismantle the universally understood meaning of marriage.

“Imagine for a moment that the Government had decided to legalise slavery but assured us that ‘no one will be forced to keep a slave’.

“Would such worthless assurances calm our fury? Would they justify dismantling a fundamental human right? Or would they simply amount to weasel words masking a great wrong?”

Church: longer Sunday trading is a ‘grave mistake’ BY MADELEINE TEAHAN

A SPOKESMAN for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales has said that the extension of Sunday trading hours during the Olympics would be a “grave mistake”, even on a temporary basis.

Following reports that the Government is considering extending Sunday trading hours during the Olympics the spokesman said: “The limited deregulation of Sunday trading has to a large extent diluted the atmosphere of Sunday as a day of rest, recreation and renewal of relationships. Nonetheless, the special atmosphere of Sunday has not been entirely lost. For many, it is still not a day like every other day.

for something other than paid work – as a day of rest and in particular for family life.

“On the whole, very many people in Britain recognise and value the distinctive nature of Sunday. We would all be the poorer if it became just like any other day of the week, and we would be concerned that any temporary further deregulation would lead to a permanent change.”

George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, confirmed on Sunday that the law would be changed in time to allow extended Sunday trading hours.

Speaking on The Andrew Marr Show he said: “We’ve got the whole world coming to London – and the rest of the country – for the Olympics.

“We believe that it would be a grave mistake to deregulate further the laws on Sunday trading, even on a temporary basis for the Olympics.

“Upholding the positive value of Sunday as it currently is would actually enable people to enjoy and celebrate the Olympics on that day.”

The spokesman continued: “The different atmosphere of Sunday which remains, despite partial deregulation, is good for society. It supports a healthier work-life balance and gives space for families and communities. It provides one small but significant bulwark against the tide of commercialism by claiming time

“It would be a great shame – particularly when some of the big Olympic events are on Sunday – if the country had a closed for business sign on it.”

He would not rule out the introduction of longer Sunday trading hours on a permanent basis. He said: “All I’m proposing at the moment is that we do this for the Olympic Games and the Paralympics.”

A spokesman for the Keep Sunday Special Campaign said the news was “profoundly worrying”. He said: “Research... has shown that Sunday working has a detrimental impact on fathers’ time with their children. Why make this situation worse?”

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