She has been bashing this one for a long time, but I have always treated her as a lady and have sometimes tried to “negotiate”. Personally, I am fond of her, but her decreasing tolerance has made me truly wince.
Here is the latest to take me up on some of the things I write: Fr. Anthony Chadwick’s response to that letter from Continuing Bishops.
I lay it on the line. Here it goes: Anyone calling himself Catholic without being formally in communion with Rome is masquerading. Unless we have converted as she has done, we are bogus and worthy only of contempt.
I have noticed this increasingly intransigent attitude for some time. Fine by me. There would only be sour grapes on my side if I really believed the “one true church” sales pitch, but I don’t. At the same time, the way Anglicanorum coetibus was implemented in the early days deeply hurt her, and we had many discussions – but then she accepted it. That’s fine by me, but I now protest against her intolerance of the continuing existence of some of the Anglican community she once belonged to.
I do give her credit for trying to be reasonable with such men as Bishop Botterill who managed the division between continuing Anglicans and Ordinariate-bound in a more peaceful way than the more heavy-handed Americans. But there comes a time when some of us are going to make an effort to survive or go under. There is no more paste in the tube for the Ordinariates. But she is handling this quite ineptly and pouring more oil on the flames.
Deborah Gyapong is the true reason I closed the old English Catholic blog, since she was on it as a contributor. I didn’t want a bust-up at the time, and I still don’t. But I am now forced to come clean with it.
It is now seems to be the parting of the ways. May God bless her in doing and writing what she feels to be right, but the limit is reached when she began trashing others. And that I cannot accept.
