Worlds Apart?

"Has that young woman fainted or what? Does she need medical attention?" asked the elderly priest standing next to me with an obvious mixture of concern and bewilderment.

As I looked at the recumbent figure just a few feet away from us, her arms neatly folded across her chest and a relaxed smile on her face, I confidently responded, "She's fine; she's just resting."

We were part way through the service of Reconciliation and Healing that takes place in the Shrine Church at Walsingham every Sunday afternoon. The many pilgrims present - including a party from my own benefice - had been sprinkled with water from the Holy Well and were now receiving the laying-on-of-hands and anointing with oil. I was one of four priests standing just below the High Altar offering the latter ministry.

Despite that old priest's consternation, the Shrine clergy themselves were clearly unfazed by the incident, and in the sacristy afterwards I overheard only one rather snide comment about 'Charismatics' from another visiting priest.

Years ago, I suspect the response might have been a veritable chorus of causticity; but thankfully, the Anglican Shrine of Our  Lady of Walsingham has moved on in this regard. I suspect this has something to do with the positive impact of the annual Youth Pilgrimage with its more contemporary and flexible approach to worship, the fact that the former Priest Administrator, Bishop Lindsay Urwin, had Charismatic leanings (proving that there is such a thing as a subtle Charismatic) and that the Anglo-Catholic Charismatic Celebration (the Traditionalist Catholic precursor and, latterly, counterpart of 'On Fire Mission') met at Walsingham for many years before its demise a couple of years ago.

With so many parishes and individuals visiting Walsingham, and given the highly-charged spiritual ambience of the place, it's inevitable that there will be a variety of responses to the way the Holy Spirit moves there. I must confess that given the increasingly inclusive Charismatic Catholic nature of our benefice, I was unsure how some of our number would feel about the place. I need not have worried. The comments were all very positive, although there was a very clear awareness that here - where there is such a palpable sense of peace - the Holy Spirit is experienced more as the gentle breath than as the mighty rushing wind. Nevertheless, as several of our pilgrims realised - and as that young woman on the sanctuary floor testified - it is still possible to be overwhelmed by the gentle breath of God.

I believe this supports my view that rather than being 'Slain in the Spirit' (i.e. effectively knocked unconscious) people are, rather, invited to gently abandon themselves in trust to the healing power of the Holy Spirit and to rest there for a time.

As I observed the congregation at that service of Healing and Reconciliation it was evident that several people were on the verge of Resting in the Spirit. They swayed visibly as they were prayed with or anointed, and the officiating clergy had to grab them by the shoulders to prevent them from falling.  The message clearly was 'Do not fall'! 

In many ways, of course, this made sense. The hard tiled floor of the Shrine Church and the absence of prayer teams with a designated 'catcher' (a 'must' at all Charismatic gatherings)  meant that a soft landing without injury couldn't be guaranteed.  I would respectfully suggest that this may be something that the Shrine authorities may need to re-think, even if only a minority of pilgrims are 'prone' to such things.

This brings me back to a question that has vexed me for some time. Given the significant impact that the Charismatic movement has had on the Roman Catholic Church, and the support it enjoys from Pope Francis, I wonder why it has made so few inroads into Anglo-Catholic parishes in general, and the traditionalist 'Society' parishes in particular. As I discovered on my Sabbatical last year, many Anglican Churches that once had a strong Charismatic Catholic tradition have either abandoned their Charismatic spirituality and reverted to being very conservative and traditional in style, whilst others have jettisoned their Catholic identity and become Evangelical Charismatic.

As I have suggested elsewhere in this blog, I suspect that the Charismatic movement is not perceived in any way as a threat to the core beliefs and values of the Roman Catholic Church. Roman Catholic Charismatics continue to recognise the Mass as being the church's principal act of worship, and  a service of Adoration and Benediction of the blessed sacrament is seized as an opportunity to glorify God in the power of the Spirit.

By contrast, in the Church of England, there is a fear that Charismatic renewal could lead to non-sacramental worship, the ditching of vestments and Catholic teaching. I can see where this fear comes from. There certainly seems to be a myopic understanding of Charismatic spirituality within the Church of England at the present time that sees the HTB model of Charismatic belief and worship as the only viable form of Charismatic Anglicanism.

This view needs to be challenged.

It is, I suspect, no coincidence, that the most devoutly Catholic members of my congregations are the ones most open to Charismatic renewal. Nor is it mere coincidence that those who have had Charismatic experiences are now being renewed in their Catholicism i.e. they are attending Mass more frequently, using the confessional more and suchlike. Indeed it was in the wake of Charismatic Renewal through our monthly 'New Fire Mass' that the request for a pilgrimage to Walsingham began to gather momentum.

I remain firmly convinced, therefore, that the Catholic and the Charismatic can - and indeed should - go together. I for one am equally happy to encounter the Holy Spirit in loud, contemporary worship as a mighty rushing wind, and in traditional Catholic worship as the still small voice. Indeed, I need a balanced diet of both!


As someone who loves Walsingham and values the peace that it offers, I hope that there will be a growing acceptance of those whose encounter there with the Holy Spirit may be manifested in ways that would probably have left Fr Hope Patten himself a little concerned and bewildered.