ANGLICAN ARCHBISHOP JUSTIN WELBY VISITS HIS MASTER THE JESUIT POPE
The Unhived Mind [UHM]
Archbishop of Canterbury and Pope meet for first time
15 June 2013 Last updated at 01:29 Share this pageEmailPrint
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22900838
The Archbishop of Canterbury has met Pope Francis for the first time since the pair became leaders of their respective Churches in March.
The Most Reverend Justin Welby’s visit to Rome has been described as brief and informal, allowing the two Church leaders to become acquainted.
Pope Francis said they shared a common desire for economic and social justice.
The Roman Catholic leader in England and Wales, Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols, is also on the visit.
Alan Johnston, the BBC’s Rome correspondent, said the Pope had spoken of the need to listen to “the cry of the poor”, and ensure that they were not abandoned to the laws of the markets.
The Vatican has praised Archbishop Welby, who has spoken out against plans to allow same-sex couples to marry, for working with Roman Catholic leaders in Britain to “safeguard” marriage and other Christian values.
The archbishop became leader of the Church of England – and leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion – in March, days after Pope Francis was inaugurated as the Supreme Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church.
The Pope said this was a “particular reason to support one another in prayer”.
But in his Vatican address, the Pope described the relationship between the two Churches as “long and complex, and not without pain”.
He touched briefly on tensions that arose when his predecessor set up a structure that helped unhappy Anglicans defect to Catholicism.
He said he was grateful for the “sincere efforts” the Church of England had made to understand why Pope Benedict XVI established the personal ordinariate.
Archbishop Welby, who is visiting Rome with his wife, wore, as is customary for visiting archbishops, an episcopal ring given to Archbishop Michael Ramsey by Pope Paul VI in 1966.
Pope and AB of Canterbury: twins in prayer and spirituality
(Vatican Radio) At the end of his first visit to the Vatican, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, said he and Pope Francis shared ideas on economic justice, on the plight of Christians in the Middle East, but also on their deeply personal experiences of God’s calling in their daily lives.
Following their morning audience and joint prayer service, the leader of the Anglican Communion described the Pope as a man of “extraordinary humanity, on fire with the Spirit of Christ”. While admitting there are obstacles on the road to reconciliation between Anglicans and Catholics, he said he sensed a new vigour and common commitment “to prove the radicality” of the Christian Gospel.
Speaking to Philippa Hitchen in the garden of the Venerable English College at the end of the brief visit, the archbishop said he and the Pope also joked about the way they had inaugurated their ministries within two days of each other earlier this year……
“We started off by just laughing….he teased me and said ‘I’m two days ahead of you. so I said ‘that’s more or less twins!’….it was a very relaxed conversation about our prayer and personal spirituality and our walk as disciples of Jesus Christ….
We talked about what it is that makes for just social and economic systems, agreeing on the need for conversion of the human heart – the law can only do so much but the heart has to be touched and that’s something where the Churches can work together very powerfully indeed…
The Anglican Communion tens to do its arguing very loudly, so everyone knows when we disagree – that doesn’t always mean they are more significant arguements than those who do that less loudly……secondly, we’re working very hard to rebuild personal relationships……(we) started a project called The Bible in the Life of the Church, helping parts of the Communion understand why other parts read the Bible in certain ways….. and we pray – in the power of God all things are possible….
Obviously there are big issues (in Anglican-Catholic relations) such as the ordination of women to the episcopate, but where I see a great deal of hope is a welling up of a sense that we cannot tollerate complacently that we live separately….there’s a sense of vigour which is important and also important work on the theological level….
Pope Francis receives Archbishop of Canterbury (Full texts)
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis on Friday met with the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby. It was the first meeting between the two.
Below, please find the complete translation of Pope Francis’ discourse at the meeting, followed by the complete text of Archbishop Welby’s address:
Your Grace, Dear Friends,
On the happy occasion of our first meeting, I make my own the words of Pope Paul VI, when he addressed Archbishop Michael Ramsey during his historic visit in 1966: “Your steps have not brought you to a foreign dwelling … we are pleased to open the doors to you, and with the doors, our heart, pleased and honoured as we are … to welcome you ‘not as a guest or a stranger, but as a fellow citizen of the Saints and the Family of God’” (cf. Eph 2:19-20).
I know that during Your Grace’s installation in Canterbury Cathedral you remembered in prayer the new Bishop of Rome. I am deeply grateful to you – and since we began our respective ministries within days of each other, I think we will always have a particular reason to support one another in prayer.
The history of relations between the Church of England and the Catholic Church is long and complex, and not without pain. Recent decades, however, have been marked by a journey of rapprochement and fraternity, and for this we give heartfelt thanks to God. This journey has been brought about both via theological dialogue, through the work of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission, and via the growth of cordial relations at every level through shared daily lives in a spirit of profound mutual respect and sincere cooperation. In this regard, I am very pleased to welcome alongside you Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster. These firm bonds of friendship have enabled us to remain on course even when difficulties have arisen in our theological dialogue that were greater than we could have foreseen at the start of our journey.
I am grateful, too, for the sincere efforts the Church of England has made to understand the reasons that led my Predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, to provide a canonical structure able to respond to the wishes of those groups of Anglicans who have asked to be received collectively into the Catholic Church: I am sure this will enable the spiritual, liturgical and pastoral traditions that form the Anglican patrimony to be better known and appreciated in the Catholic world.
Today’s meeting is an opportunity to remind ourselves that the search for unity among Christians is prompted not by practical considerations, but by the will of the Lord Jesus Christ himself, who made us his brothers and sisters, children of the One Father. Hence the prayer that we make today is of fundamental importance.
This prayer gives a fresh impulse to our daily efforts to grow towards unity, which are concretely expressed in our cooperation in various areas of daily life. Particularly important among these is our witness to the reference to God and the promotion of Christian values in a world that seems at times to call into question some of the foundations of society, such as respect for the sacredness of human life or the importance of the institution of the family built on marriage, a value that you yourself have had occasion to recall recently.
Then there is the effort to achieve greater social justice, to build an economic system that is at the service of man and promotes the common good. Among our tasks as witnesses to the love of Christ is that of giving a voice to the cry of the poor, so that they are not abandoned to the laws of an economy that seems at times to treat people as mere consumers.
I know that Your Grace is especially sensitive to all these questions, in which we share many ideas, and I am also aware of your commitment to foster reconciliation and resolution of conflicts between nations. In this regard, together with Archbishop Nichols, you have urged the authorities to find a peaceful solution to the Syrian conflict such as would guarantee the security of the entire population, including the minorities, not least among whom are the ancient local Christian communities. As you yourself have observed, we Christians bring peace and grace as a treasure to be offered to the world, but these gifts can bear fruit only when Christians live and work together in harmony. This makes it easier to contribute to building relations of respect and peaceful coexistence with those who belong to other religious traditions, and with non-believers.
The unity we so earnestly long for is a gift that comes from above and it is rooted in our communion of love with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. As Christ himself promised, “where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Mt 18:20). Let us travel the path towards unity, fraternally united in charity and with Jesus Christ as our constant point of reference. In our worship of Jesus Christ we will find the foundation and raison d’être of our journey. May the merciful Father hear and grant the prayers that we make to him together. Let us place all our hope in him who “is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think” (Eph 3:20).
Below, please find the complete text of Archbishop Justin Welby’s address to Pope Francis, which was delivered in English:
Your Holiness,
Dear Friends:
I am full of love and gratitude to be here. In the last few days we have been remembering the death of Blessed Pope John XXIII in the midst of the Second Vatican Council. At the Requiem said at Lambeth Palace fifty years ago this weekend by Archbishop Michael Ramsey, my much-loved predecessor said of him: ‘Pope John has shown us again the power of being, by being a man who touches human hearts with charity. So there has come to many a new longing for the unity of all Christians, and a new knowledge that however long the road may be, charity already makes all the difference to it.’
Having for many years found inspiration in the great corpus of Catholic social teaching, and worked on its implications with Catholic groups; having spent retreats in new orders of the Church in France, and being accompanied by the Prior of another new order; I do indeed feel that I am (in the words of Pope Paul VI to Archbishop Michael) coming to a place where I can feel myself at home.
Your Holiness, we are called by the Holy Spirit of God, through our fraternal love, to continue the work that has been the precious gift to popes and archbishops of Canterbury for these past fifty years, and of which this famous ring is the enduring token. I pray that the nearness of our two inaugurations may serve the reconciliation of the world and the Church.
As you have stressed, we must promote the fruits of our dialogue; and, with our fellow bishops, we must give expression to our unity in faith through prayer and evangelisation. It is only as the world sees Christians growing visibly in unity that it will accept through us the divine message of peace and reconciliation.
However, the journey is testing and we cannot be unaware that differences exist about how we bring the Christian faith to bear on the challenges thrown up by modern society. But our ‘goal is great enough to justify the effort of the journey’ (Benedict XVI, Spe salvi 1), and we can trust in the prayer of Christ, ‘ut omnes unum sint’ (Jn 17.21). A firm foundation of friendship will enable us to be hopeful in speaking to one another about those differences, to bear one another’s burdens, and to be open to sharing the discernment of a way forward that is faithful to the mind of Christ pressed upon us as disciples.
That way forward must reflect the self-giving love of Christ, our bearing of his Cross, and our dying to ourselves so as to live with Christ, which will show itself in hospitality and love for the poor. We must love those who seek to oppose us, and love above all those tossed aside—even whole nations—by the present crises around the world. Also, even as we speak, our brothers and sisters in Christ suffer terribly from violence, oppression and war, from bad government and unjust economic systems. If we are not their advocates in the name of Christ, who will be?
Your Holiness, dear brother, I assure you of the love, respect and prayer of the bishops, clergy and people of the Anglican Communion.
theunhivedmind on June 15, 2013 at 12:54 am said:
Seems we are in a ground hog day except instead of Rowan Williams we now have Justice Welby sucking up to the Temporal Power and his Cardinal minions. Notice how we see Vincent Nichols is also over in Rome at the same time shadowing Welby. Where have we seen this before? Of course we saw it all the time with Cardinal Cormac O’Connor shadowing Rowan Williams. The Archbishop of Westminster is the master of the Archbishop of Canterbury in the covert power system not visible to the mass public.
Archbishop Michael Ramsey receiving his ring from the Temporal Power
Do you not find it interesting how the Archbishop of Canterbury has to wear this episcopal ring since 1966? I think this should reveal some clues to the timing of certain subordinations. May we remember that the Protestant Knights of Malta came together with the Order of Malta from 1961-63 and this was achieved through the Alliance of the Orders of St John of Jerusalem based in Geneva, Switzerland a canton run by Papist, Prince Vittorio Emanuele IV (Order of Malta, Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus). Notice the timing of when Pedro Arrupe prepared the Jesuits for a New World Order it was from 1965, again in the sixties.
Lets not forget how Rowan Williams has prayed in the Vatican, the worship centre for the evil of Baal known as Jupiter or in Egypt Ptah or the western names of Peter and Patrick (is it any wonder many Irish Catholics take this name). Rowan Williams also lectured in the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome run by the evil Jesuit Order. In Britain it is the Jesuits based at the Provincial Office in 114 Mount Steet, Westminster which control Britain for the Curia Generalizia in Borgo Santo Spirito. The controller of Britain is Fr Dermot Preston SJ, he and his Jesuits are aided by powerful Norman families like the Howard, Percy and Butler houses as well as the Pallavicini from Genoa and Venice. Study the connection of the Howard family to the home of the Archbishop of Westminster.
-= The Unhived Mind