Analysis: Lonely journey from Canterbury to Rome

Published on Monday 18 July 2011 17:21

Probably the biggest noticeable impact from the ordination of Len Black as a Catholic priest will not be on the 77 million-strong Anglican Communion or even the 52,000 faithful in the Scottish Episcopal Church, - but on transportation and the environment.

This is because Father Black (the sole "defector" of his kind in Scotland so far) will now need to travel some considerable way south of Berwick in order to meet the small number of colleagues who have made the same journey from Canterbury to Rome.

Some 60 Anglican clergy in England - the great majority in the South - have now been received into the Catholic priesthood under the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, as the special section for ex-Anglicans is known. To put that in context, there are 10,000 priests and deacons in the Church of England.

The clergy numbers are far smaller in Scotland. But in the Scottish Episcopal Church, few if any are likely to follow Len Black's example.

Of course, there remain some Episcopal parishes opposed to women priests (the defining issue for the conservative Forward in Faith movement Fr Black served). But the overwhelming ethos of Anglicanism here is inclusive, and will remain so.

Although the ordinariate has been good at getting publicity, and there is talk of a 1 million charitable fund for what even the Catholic Herald terms its "struggling members", the overall impact of Catholic priestly recruitment in the citadels of Anglicanism remains slight.

Lay membership across Britain amounts to around 900, estimates Simon Sarmiento of the well-connected Thinking Anglicans. Meanwhile, the Ordinariate has little traction or organisation in either Scotland, where there are 20 lay members, or in Wales, where there are none.

• Simon Barrow is co-director of the religion and society think tank Ekklesia (www.ekklesia.co.uk)