Irish Anglicans and the mission of the Ordinariate: a Community of St Augustine of Canterbury?

One of the newly-ordained priests in the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham - Fr. Ian Hellyer - celebrated his first mass as a Catholic priest on Sunday past, the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity.  In his homily he emphasised the vocation of the Ordinariate to participate in the new evangelisation:

I am not alone amongst the clergy of the ordinariate to think that I did not give up my position in the C of E to form some sort of catholic holy club ; a place to feel comfortable in, within the Catholic church. I believe a very significant part of the establishment of the ordinariate is missionary. We have work to do in the new evangelisation of the people of England. And as clergy we have been struggling to make sure we have time to go out there, to meet people, to field their questions, to allay their fears, to teach… Our time could very easily have been taken up with diocesan work, very easily. But we haven’t joined the ordinariate for that. We are very happy to help the parishes of the diocese but that is not our main work. The ordinariate has been set up to reconcile the English people with the Catholic Faith, the Catholic Church. We have a mission.

Our situation in Ireland - both Northern Ireland and the Republic - is very different.  There will be no Church of Ireland parishes petitioning to become part of an Ordinariate, as has happened in England and the United States.  There are, I am sure, no Irish Anglican clergy seeking to serve in the Ordinariate.  And because of the absence of a St Stephen's House, Oxford or a Nashotah House, there has been no tradition of Irish Anglican clergy receiving a catholic formation for ordination.  This being so, the provisions of Anglicanorum Coetibus would not apply in Ireland as they have done in England and will do in the United States.

But this does not mean that a small grouping of Irish Anglicans could not respond to the call of Anglicanorum Coetibus, form a Community of (let us say) St Augustine of Canterbury, be catechised according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, be received into the Catholic Church, and as a community assemble on a regular basis for the Anglican-Use Daily Office and for extra-liturgical devotions.  Perhaps a priest from the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham could act as an occasional chaplain, to celebrate Mass according to the Anglican-Use, or a priest from a Catholic diocese in Ireland could be authorised to celebrate Mass according to the Anglican-Use. 

Such a Community of St Augustine of Canterbury would indeed be small and, in the eyes of the world, rather insignificant.  But is would be a sign of the hope and promise of Anglicanorum Coetibus on an island in which the legacy of the Reformation has left bitter divisions.  What is more, it could also contribute to the new evangelisation, ensuring that what Anglicanorum Coetibus described as "the liturgical, spiritual and pastoral traditions of the Anglican Communion" find their place in the mission of the Catholic Church "as a precious gift ... and as a treasure to be shared".