WDTPRS congratulations to Fr. John Hunwicke

It is the season for ordinations. I participated in one yesterday, as a matter of fact. However, the other day there was an ordination which I very much would like to have attended: Fr. John Hunwicke, a former Anglican priest, and engaging blogger, now a priest for the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham in England. I saw Fr. Hunwicke recently in London at a conference of the Latin Mass Society.

Here is a nice story about Fr. Hunwicke in the UK’s best Catholic weekly, The Catholic Herald HERE.  It interesting that across the pond people are a bit more apt to use the term “blogger“.  I believe this is a mark of the influence good blogs have among Catholics – at all levels of the hierarchy – in England.  It is certainly the case in the USA that Catholic blogs now exercise influence, at times even persuasive force. It may be even more the case in England, since the Catholic population has a different identity.  They are also a Church in transition.

Therefore, when it comes to bloggers and how to treat them, I am reminded of what Hamlet told Polonius about how treat the players when they came to Elsinore:

Good my lord, will you see the players well
bestowed? Do you hear, let them be well used; for
they are the abstract and brief chronicles of the
time: after your death you were better have a bad
epitaph than their ill report while you live.

I hope you will all with me wish Fr. Hunwicke all the best.

He is now a new kid on the block, as a Catholic priest and as a Catholic blogger.

Speaking of priests and Catholic bloggers, here is my good friend Fr. Tim Finigan laying hands on the ordinand:

Fr. Finigan describes the ordination HERE.  NLM has notes on his First Mass as a Catholic priest.

And in case I have not said it recently enough…

Benedict XVI is the Pope of Christian Unity.

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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9 Comments

  1. (X)MCCLXIII says:

    Dear Father,

    I wonder – what did you mean by “church in transition”?

  2. Indulgentiam says:

    Sursum Corda! With great joy and gratitude I congratulate you Fr. Hunwicke. I pray Our Lady will protect and guide you always and in all ways.

    DEO Gratias!

  3. jessicahoff says:

    I am delighted that Fr. Hunwicke is now a Catholic priest. Your readers may know that there was a long delay in allowing his ordination. Did he get on a bus and complain? No, he did what a good Catholic should do, trusted in God and waited. The Magisterium of Nuns could learn a lot from him – as we all can. I do hope his blog starts up again properly, I do miss it. It is a perfect complement to your own Father.

  4. Supertradmum says:

    I did not make the Ordination, but the First Mass was great. He is an asset to the Church, and may God bless him, his wife, Pam and family. We are so blessed.

  5. mike cliffson says:

    And the compound “priest-blogger”?

  6. Ralph says:

    Welcome and congratulations Father Hunwicke!

    As a side question, among the faithful in England, is there a resistance to married priests? I have been wondering how these former Anglicans who already have wives and families would be welcomed.

    My own opinion is that there are good eastern priests who are married and bad western priests who are celebite. I don’t think being married is a hindrance or a help in all cases.

    But, I am a convert. I know some cradle catholic friends who find it unacceptable.

  7. Bea says:

    Ralph
    I am a cradle Catholic. It would seem strange to me to see a married priest.
    But what the Church allows is always acceptable.
    I believe our first pope (St. Peter) either was a widower or still married:
    Douay-Rheims Bible Luke 4:38
    So as Catholics we shouldn’t complain or find it unacceptable, but rejoice, welcome and congratulate Father Hunwicke, may The Holy Ghost be his guide and companion in his guidance of souls.

  8. Blaise says:

    Ralph
    I am a cradle catholic and English. As you are probably aware a considerable number of former Anglican clergy were ordained as catholic priests over a period a few years back at the time then Anglican church allowed women “priests.” So the new priests ordained to the Ordinariate are not the first significant instance of this here.
    Married priests are definitely an oddity and an exception. In the Anglican church the vicar’s wife seems to have an important role / position in a parish. My experience has been that wives of former anglican clergy have kept a very low profile when their husbands have been ordained as catholic priests and I think this makes it a bit less controversial in practice.
    I can see a justification for it as an exception to take account of the different rule of the anglican church. However, I see no argument from this exceptional permission to any universal extension of marriage among clergy and am conifdent that the presence of these married former anglicans will not really raise this as a question for the Church on an ongoing basis. It is to be hoped in years to come that the Ordinariate will produce many new vocations of Catholic priests among young unmarried men. I see no reason why it should not.

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