Fort Worth bishop to play part in Vatican plan for Anglicans

From Ft. Worth- (Bishop Vann is the R.C. Bishop of Ft. Worth)

The Vatican, working with its Fort Worth Diocese and Bishop Kevin Vann, is launching a structure today to allow Anglican parishes and their married priests in the United States to join the Roman Catholic Church.More than 1,300 Anglicans, including 100 priests, have applied to be part of a new body, essentially a diocese.

Among them are members of St. Luke's in Bladensburg, Md., which last summer became the first group in the country to convert to Catholicism.Vann, leader of the Fort Worth Diocese, said in an interview Sunday that he will oversee requests nationwide from Episcopal priests who wish to become Catholic."My job is to oversee any individual Episcopal priests [who want to become Catholics] ... individually rather than as a group," he said. Under the Vatican plan, St. Mary the Virgin Catholic Church in Arlington, a former Anglican parish that came into the diocese years ago under Fort Worth Bishop Joseph Delaney, will be part of the new group, Vann said.

The Vatican's new structure will be a small push toward reuniting Protestants and Catholics, who split nearly 500 years ago.Pope Benedict XVI established the dioceselike ordinariate, led by a priest with ties to Fort Worth, after persistent requests from Anglicans to become Catholic in groups, Catholic leaders said. This is only the second such structure; the first serves England and Wales. Traditional Anglicans in several countries have become increasingly upset by the ordination of women and gay bishops. Formerly, Anglican converts to Catholicism were accepted case by case.

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http://www.star-telegram.com/2012/01/02/3628486/fort-worth-bishop-to-play-part.html#storylink=cpy