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Australia's Traditional Anglicans Vote to Convert to Catholicism
The Daily Telegraph (UK) ^ | 2/16/10 | Bonnie Malkin and Martin Beckford

Posted on 02/17/2010 6:12:21 AM PST by marshmallow

Traditionalist Anglicans in Australia have become the first to vote in favour of leaving their national church and converting to Roman Catholicism.

Forward in Faith Australia, part of the Anglo-Catholic group that also has members in Britain and America, is setting up a working party guided by a Catholic bishop to work out how its followers can cross over to Rome.

It is believed to be the first group within the Anglican church to accept Pope Benedict XVI’s unprecedented offer for disaffected members of the Communion to convert en masse while retaining parts of their spiritual heritage.

So far only the Traditional Anglican Communion, which has already broken away from the 70 million-strong Anglican Communion, has declared that its members will become Catholics under the Apostolic Constitution.

The Rt Rev David Robarts OAM, chairman of FIF Australia, said members of the association felt excluded by the Anglican Church in Australia, which had not provided them with a bishop to champion their conservative views on homosexuality and women bishops.

"In Australia we have tried for a quarter of a decade to get some form of episcopal oversight but we have failed," he told The Daily Telegraph.

"We're not really wanted any more, our conscience is not being respected."

Bishop Robarts, 77, said it had become clear that Anglicans who did not believe in same-sex partnerships or allowing women to be ordained as bishops had no place in the "broader Anglican spectrum".

"We're not shifting the furniture, we're simply saying that we have been faithful Anglicans upholding what Anglicans have always believed and we're not wanting to change anything, but we have been marginalised by people who want to introduce innovations.

(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...


TOPICS: Catholic; Ecumenism; Mainline Protestant
KEYWORDS: anglican; catholic

1 posted on 02/17/2010 6:12:21 AM PST by marshmallow
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To: sionnsar; Huber; trad_anglican

Ping!


2 posted on 02/17/2010 1:26:59 PM PST by NYer ("Where Peter is, there is the Church." - St. Ambrose of Milan)
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To: netmilsmom; thefrankbaum; markomalley; Tax-chick; GregB; saradippity; Berlin_Freeper; Litany; ...
Welcome home!

Catholic Ping
Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list


3 posted on 02/17/2010 1:27:44 PM PST by NYer ("Where Peter is, there is the Church." - St. Ambrose of Milan)
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To: NYer

Thanks for the ping. I think this is the first group from within the “official” Anglican Communion to declare its intention to pursue the Ordinariate.


4 posted on 02/17/2010 1:46:55 PM PST by trad_anglican
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To: NYer; monkapotamus

NYER I wonder if we seeing the end of Anglican Church as we know it


5 posted on 02/17/2010 2:11:05 PM PST by SevenofNine ("We are Freepers, all your media belong to us, resistence is futile")
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To: SevenofNine
I wonder if we seeing the end of Anglican Church as we know it

As we know it ... meaning one, united, Anglican communion. Not positive, but I am of the understanding that the Anglican Church has already split several times. Of one thing we can be certain, those Anglicans who have held true to tradition, are the ones choosing to rejoin the Catholic Church. These are the members of the Traditional Anglican Communion.

6 posted on 02/17/2010 3:49:19 PM PST by NYer ("Where Peter is, there is the Church." - St. Ambrose of Milan)
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To: NYer

We may be seeing history in making EH


7 posted on 02/17/2010 4:25:08 PM PST by SevenofNine ("We are Freepers, all your media belong to us, resistence is futile")
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To: marshmallow

Welcome home, I believe we are going to see more and more of this. And not just from the Anglican church, but also from the Lutheran, Episcopal and Methodist churses also.


8 posted on 02/17/2010 4:49:32 PM PST by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: marshmallow

Lets hope that this allows our seminaries to be filled with good conservative Catholics that will hold to the faith and pass it on.


9 posted on 02/18/2010 3:14:37 AM PST by verga (I am not an apologist, I just play one on Television)
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