[The Rev. Steven] Anderson’s journey to the Catholic Church had a few stops along with the way, which explains why he was named a priest with a wife and children.
After graduating from high school, Anderson spent a year at Adrian College before transferring to Oral Roberts University, where he received a bachelor’s degree in biblical literature. He later earned a master’s degree in divinity from Oral Roberts, in Tulsa, Okla.
In 1995, he became a priest in the Charismatic Episcopal Church, a denomination that began in 1992.
Anderson converted to Catholicism after reading work from some of the earliest writers of the church.
Big deal. There were married Roman priests for a thousand years. There have been at least some even since Rome imposed celibacy on all ranks of the clergy. Uniate Catholic clergy are allowed to marry (except in the US where Latin Rite bishops prevailed on Rome to forbid it). And in the East in general the custom has been to follow the canons of the OEcumenical Councils that prohibit marriage after ordination and require bishops to be celibate.
I may not live to see it, but one day Rome will yield on this. There is no compelling argument for celibacy to be compulsory for all clergy. And fewer people are willing to accept that marriage and the calling to Holy Orders is an “either or” choice. Celibacy is a very high and noble calling… for those who have it. But not many do.
Historically Rome has always had problems enforcing it within the clergy. In many cases bishops simply nodded and winked rather than deal with the open scandal that would have resulted had they attempted to crack down. This remains true even today. There are many RC priests that live semi-openly with their “wives” with the full knowledge of their bishops. I know of two myself (one is now retired).
And of course there is also the problem that this discipline has caused by creating an engraved invitation for sexual deviants looking for a place where they could hide in plain sight. Those chickens have been coming home to roost for the last decade or so.
Well, the RC church could always wait ten years and see what happens to the TEC. .. . .Oh, wait! What year is this? Oh, I thought it was 1979. Sorry.
The Charismatic Episcopal Church had a lot of potential and seemed for a long time – 10 years? – a new-denomination success story. They weren’t what you might think; they weren’t ex-Episcopalians. Rather Pentecostals and/or charismatics who read the church fathers and, rather parallelling the Evangelical Orthodox Church before it became really Orthodox, become do-it-yourself anglicans (as opposed to Anglicans = Lambeth, like the Episcopalians).
They split up after what I believe were Jim Bakker/Jimmy Swaggart-type sex scandals in the clergy; they seemed not to understand how an episcopal/hierarchical church is supposed to respond to these things (objective, impartial canon law and teaching that the grace of the ministry is not connected to the worthiness of the minister) and reverted to reacting like Pentecostals, falling into a kind of Donatism about unrighteous ministers lacking grace.
Anyway a number of ex-CEC parishes are now Antiochian Orthodox Western Rite Vicariate ones… now using the English Missal, a form of the oldest approved Western Rite Orthodox Mass, the Tridentine Mass in KJV/old BCP-style English. Which is making a comeback, gaining on the American/Anglican Missal (enhanced US 1928 BCP) majority of the WRV.
That’s right; they’ve gone from charismatic to advanced anglo-catholic (see my note above about capitalisation). With God all things are possible.