"A sense of continuity and change"

In his homily at the ordination of priests for the Ordinariate in Birmingham earlier this week, Mgr Keith Newton addressed the issue of Anglican orders and the calling of the Ordinariate to bring to wholeness and completion the Anglican tradition:

This afternoon the eight of you will be ordained to the priesthood in the Catholic Church.  You have been called by Christ – a truth you must never forget – and that calling has been ratified by the Church. There is for you all both a sense of continuity and of change. There is continuity because that call to Christian ministry first came to you some years ago, in some cases many years ago.  You have many years of faithful service and experience to bring with you but you will also be aware that your ministry in the future will be set in a totally new context as priest of the Catholic Church.  Your ordination today will be a fulfillment and completion of all that has gone before but it will also be radically different as you will exercise that ministry of word and sacrament from the heart of the Church in communion with the successor of Peter, whom Pope Benedict reminded us in his homily at Westminster Abbey ‘is charged with a particular care for the Unity of Christ’s flock’.