The first principle of the Ordinariate is then about Christian unity. St. Basil the Great, the Church’s greatest ecumenist, literally expended his life on the work of building bridges between orthodox brethren who shared a common faith, but who had become separated from one another in a Church badly fragmented by heresy and controversy. He taught that the work of Christian unity requires deliberate and ceaseless effort...St. Basil often talked with yearning about the archaia agape, the ancient love of the apostolic community, so rarely seen in the Church of his day. This love, he taught, is a visible sign that the Holy Spirit is indeed present and active, and it is absolutely essential for the health of the Church.

- Msgr. Jeffrey Steenson, Homily on the Occasion of his Formal Institution as Ordinary

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

David Lewis Stokes: On the pope’s outreach to Episcopalians

Tuesday, October 27, 2009
by David Lewis Stokes

IN EARLY JUNE 1999 I was deposed as a priest in the Episcopal Church. By the month’s end my family and I were received into the Roman Catholic Church. And four years later, I was ordained a priest under what is called the Pastoral Provision.

At that time I made the resolve neither to write about my conversion nor to engage in religious skirmishes on the op-ed page. Knowing that “informed public discourse” is an oxymoron, I had no desire to give offense to a church whose spirituality I loved (and still love) and whose people I had been privileged to serve...

Read the rest in the Providence Journal.
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