By Kevin Jones
.- The small congregation of St. Luke’s Episcopal parish in Bladensburg, Maryland will join the Catholic Church through the Anglican Ordinariate structure created by Pope Benedict XVI.
“We welcome the St. Luke community warmly into our family of faith,” Cardinal Donald W. Wuerl of Washington said June 6. “The proposed ordinariate provides a path to unity, one that recognizes our shared beliefs on matters of faith while also recognizing and respecting the liturgical heritage of the Anglican Church.”
He said the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington recognizes “the openness of the community to the guidance of the Holy Spirit in their faith journey.”
The community will begin to prepare for reception into the Catholic Church later this year. Its married rector, Rev. Mark Lewis, hopes to begin the process to be ordained a Catholic priest.
Cardinal Wuerl is supporting the parish’s transition, as is Episcopal Bishop John Bryson Chane of Washington.
“I am deeply grateful to Cardinal Wuerl and to Bishop Chane for their support throughout this discernment,” Rev. Lewis said. “We look forward to continuing to worship in the Anglican tradition, while at the same time being in full communion with the Holy See of Peter.”
The parish has about 100 members, the majority of whom are from Africa and the Caribbean.
Under an agreement with the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, the parish will continue to worship in its current church building under a lease with a purchase option.
Bishop Chane said the transition was achieved “in a spirit of pastoral sensitivity and mutual respect.”
“Christians move from one church to another with far greater frequency than in the past, sometimes as individuals, sometimes as groups. I was glad to be able to meet the spiritual needs of the people and priest of St. Luke’s in a way that respects the tradition and polity of both of our Churches,” Bishop Chane said in a statement issued by the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.
Continue reading about this wondrous good news here: Md. Episcopal parish to join Catholic Church through ordinariate :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)
+Laus Deo!
