Fr Hunwicke's Ordination

Yesterday evening I attended the Ordination to the priesthood in the Catholic Church of my good friend John Hunwicke from the Ordinariate. The service was held at the Oxford Oratory and the ordination itself conducted by Bishop William Kenney, who referred in his homily to Fr Hunwicke's many years of priestly experience.

In the crowded sanctuary there were diocesan and Ordinariate clergy, the Provost of the Oxford Oratory, the Prior of Blackfriars and Fr Aidan Nicols from the Dominicans, Fr Tim Finigan and two Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer from the Orkneys.

The congregation included an Orthodox priest, family and friends from Oxford, including Fr Hunwicke's former churchwardens from St Thomas', now both in the Ordinariate, members of the Ordinariate and old friends from his days at Lancing - one former pupil, living on the south coast and unable to attend himself had summoned his parents from Birmingham to represent him.

Afterwards as I knelt to receive his First Blessing in the courtyard it was a great joy to be able to congratulate Fr Hunwicke and to say that he was now where he should be in the wider unity of the Catholic priesthood. I think there was widespread sense of gratitude that this long-delayed ordination had now occurred.

The reception afterwards was in the garden of St Benet's Hall, and an opportunity to catch up with old friends and reflect upon the number of us who, either individually or through the Ordinariate, have entered into full peace and communion in recent years.

There will, I am sure, be pictures available soon of the evening, and I will link to them once they are available.

Rejoicing in the Holy Trinity

I managed on my return to Oxford yesterday to attend the Ordinariate Group's Mass at Holy Rood where the preacher was John Hunwicke, and exercising his ministry as a Deacon following his Ordination thereto last week.

In his sermon on the Holy Trinity he drew attention to the point that what we are called to do on Trinity Sunday is to celebrate the One in Three and Three in One, and not to attempt, with all the attendent theological dangers, to seek to understand it. Thus, as he pointed out, the customary antiphons for the day suggest an intellectual intoxication with the idea of the Trinity, a sheer delight in its wonderous unity and self-sufficiency that commands our worship and celebration.

This, it seems to me, is a very good point, and far better than trying to re-invent the Trinity, or at least Trinitarian theology in a parish sermon. Much more sensible, celebrate the Mystery, and rejoice in what has been revealed to us. When the composer of the Athanasian Creed said the Trinity was incomprehensible he knew what he was saying, and knew what he could not say, and did not try to.

The Adoration of the Holy Trinity

Albrecht Dürer, 1511

Image:idlespeculations

There is an online article about the painting at Adoration of the Trinity
 

Conferring the Diaconate

This morning Bishop Alan Hopes will ordain 21 former Anglican clergy to the Diaconate for the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham in Westminster Cathedral. Amongst them is my good friend John Hunwicke.

To mark the occasion I am posting a painting by the Catalan artist Jaume Huguet (1412-92) from his Retaule de Sant Vicenç de Sarrià‎, of 1455-60 which is now in the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya in Barcelona.

In this panel St Vincent is ordained as deacon by his Bishop, St Valerius of Saragossa:

Image:Wikimedia

As with contemporary late medieval Netherlandish and German art I delight in the details of liturgy and contemporary life and costume such paintings record. As a painting it is a splendid representation of the beauty of medieval ritual and practice.

 As with the great Lisbon panels depicting St Vincent, themselves of the 1460s, the use of a red pileus is shown - is this, I wonder, an indication of membership of the episcopal familia and the equivalent of a Monseigneurial or canonical biretta today?

May St Stephen, St Lawrence and St Vincent join us in praying for these new Deacons.

News from John Hunwicke

John Hunwicke of the Ordinariate group here in Oxford has some good News to report - read what he says. My continuing prayers and good wishes for him and Pam.

John Hunwicke preaching in Latin

The official language of the University of Oxford is still Latin, and each January there is a Latin Sermon preached before the University in the Church of St Mary the Virgin - Newman's church from 1828 until 1843.

Last Sunday the preacher was John Hunwicke, a former Anglican priest and member of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, and for many years a teacher of Classics at Lancing College. He is not unknown to many readers of this blog I suspect. For those who have not seen it his sermon, complete with a translation, can be read by following this link: Legite plura...

With acknowledgements to the website of Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham