Author Archives: Scott Anderson

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About Scott Anderson

Formerly an Anglican priest (ordained 1975) received into the Catholic Church in February 2012, and ordained to the Diaconate on 27th July 2013. I took early retirement, and divide my time between London and northern France. I am deeply committed to the Ordinariate as a gift of the Holy Spirit in the search for unity. Like many Ordinariate members I feel a personal gratitude to Pope Emeritus Benedict, together with loyalty to our Holy Father, Pope Francis. My blog tries to make a small contribution to the growth of the Ordinariate by asking questions (and proposing some answers) about the 'Anglican Patrimony'. I have always been fascinated by the whole issue of growth and decline, and therefore concerned for appropriate means of evangelisation in western Europe. I believe that the Holy Spirit is constantly renewing the People of God and that we must be open to him. On Saturday 19th October 2013, I was ordained to the Priesthood at Most Precious Blood, Borough, by the Most Revd Peter Smith, Archbishop of Southwark, for the service of the Ordinariate of our Lady of Walsingham. I continued to serve the Ordinariate group and Parish at Most Precious Blood until the end of 2014. Subsequently, I helped in the care of the Ordinariate Groups at Hemel Hempstead and Croydon, and in the Archdiocese of Southwark, until the beginning of September 2015. With the agreement of my Ordinary, , the Bishop of Amiens appointed me Administrator of the Parish of Notre Dame des Etangs (Pont Remy) in Picardie, France. After nine years as parish priest, with wonderful and supportive parishioners, I decided that the time had come to retire and return to the UK. A nasty accident four years ago and contracting COVID has left me physically rather feeble! I shall be ever grateful for the years in France, a wonderful ending to the years of parish ministry. So here I am back in the UK, taking a long rest, setting up home, coping with all the new Safeguarding procedures - and wondering what next.

Where did it start to go wrong?

In 1995 I was having dinner with a group of (Roman) Catholic clergy, including one who had been recently received from the Church of England. He was still pretty angry and predicting the imminent collapse of the C of E. … Continue reading

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New French Missal

At long last the Catholic Church in France (and the other francophone countries) is to have its new translation of the Missal, which comes into use on Advent Sunday 2021. At last I shall not be the only priest in … Continue reading

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Communion on the tongue – why the controversy?

Last Sunday I was confronted at the moment of Holy Communion by a young woman insisting on receiving the consecrated host on the tongue. Currently this is not permitted in France, as part of the COVID precautions. In the liturgical … Continue reading

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Gender – nature or nurture?

Over the weekend 19/20 June there were reports that the CEO of Stonewall, Nancy Kelley, had made a startling comparison. She asserted that those who held the view that gender is biologically fixed and cannot be altered, were akin to … Continue reading

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English music & English Churches – trying to define the patrimony

Between the end of the 19th century until the 1970’s English music enjoyed a period of greatness perhaps not seen since the time of Purcell, maybe even since the flowering of English music under the Tudors. Composers such as Elgar, … Continue reading

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Sheffield: a remarkable story of evangelism

The Revd Paul Benfield, writing in the Ordinariate Portal magazine, comments thus on the current reorganisation of the Anglican diocese of Sheffield: ” … the Diocese of Sheffield is to have four further Associate Archdeacon Transition Enablers towork with two … Continue reading

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(Anglo) Catholic Renewal – Loughborough & Caister

A friend of mine has been reading ‘Catholics in Crisis’ by Francis Penhale. Written in 1986 it was part of a Mowbray’s series on the Church of England. (At one time I had another book in the same series, ‘Evangelicals … Continue reading

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War graves – and racism!

My great uncle, Frank Anderson, died of his wounds in the Great War. His body is buried in the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery at Aubigny-sur-Artois in the Nord departement in France. Here in the Somme is the Chinese Cemetery at … Continue reading

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Entering the Catholic Church – Catechumenate, Reception, Infant Baptism …

The title of this post indicates the three ways in which people become Catholic Christians. But there is a lack of coherence, a mismatch, if you like, between the three. Research has shown that a substantial of people become Catholics … Continue reading

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Praying in troubled times

On Good Friday a special intercession was added to the Solemn Prayers of the Liturgy. Here is the prayer for use with the Ordinary Form: Let us pray also for all those who suffer the consequences of the current pandemic, … Continue reading

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