The mystery of primacy in a time of crisis

Even in the best of times, it would not be easy for an Irish Anglican to consider Anglicanorum Coetibus.  The cultural and historical divisions on this island are such that the theological rationale for any Anglican seeking to enter communion with the Catholic Church will face suspicion from both traditions.

In the dramatic circumstances created by the response to the Cloyne Report, however, those Irish Anglicans prayerfully reflecting on Anglicanorum Coetibus face an even more difficult situation.  It is, therefore, appropriate to consider some words from the Orthodox theologian Olivier Clement's work You are Peter:

I don't care much for Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome ... The true Saint Peter's is underground, and to grasp this is to understand how, during the first centuries, the church of Rome was venerated as the church of the martyr-apostles Peter and Paul, then as that of the martyr-bishops, and that its true role could only be one of martyria - in the special double sense of witness and martyrdom.

Here, then, is the mystery of the primacy of the church at Rome, the primacy which the ARCIC process urged Anglicans to re-receive and which Anglicanorum Coetibus makes possible for those from the Anglican tradition.  Beyond the shame of the child abuse crisis, beyond the actions of the Curia, a prayerful reflection of Anglicanorum Coetibus will reaffirm the mystery of this primacy - the mystery of the gift of the church of the martyrs Peter and Paul.