THE ORDER OF MELCHISEDECH A Defence of the Catholic Priesthood by Michael Davies 1979 AND 1993 Sacredos in æternum secundum Ordinem Melchisedech CONTENTS Foreword Author's Introduction CHAPTER I: THE CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD CHAPTER II: THE PROTESTANT POSITION CHAPTER III: NEW IDEAS AND OLD MISTAKES CHAPTER IV: ANGLICAN ORDERS------ABSOLUTELY NULL AND UTTERLY VOID CHAPTER V: THE ANGLICAN-CATHOLICS CHAPTER VI: AGREEMENT ON THE MINISTRY CHAPTER VII: THE NEW CATHOLIC RITE OF ORDINATION CHAPTER VIII: AN ANGLICAN RESPONSE CHAPTER IX: TOWARDS A COMMON ORDINAL CHAPTER X: BLURRING THE PRIESTHOOD APPENDIX I: THE SUBSTANCE OF A SACRAMENT APPENDIX II: MINISTERIAL INTENTION APPENDIX III: PARTICIPATION OF PROTESTANT OBSERVERS IN COMPILATION OF NEW LITURGICAL TEXTS APPENDIX IV: THE APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION APPENDIX V: THE POWER TO CONFIRM AND ORDAIN APPENDIX VI: PAPAL DOCUMENTS RELATING TO ANGLICAN ORDERS APPENDIX VII: SACRIFICE AND PRIESTHOOD IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH APPENDIX VIII: ARCIC-----THE VATICAN RESPONSE APPENDIX IX: THE REVISED ORDINAL OF 1989 APPENDIX X: THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF THE CHURCH APPENDIX XI: THE FORM FOR THE ORDINATION OF A PRIEST WORKS CITED VIEW AN IMAGE OF ABRAHAM AND MELCHIZEDEK Foreword On 30 June 1968, pope Paul VI pronounced his Credo in which the doctrine of the Sacrifice of the Mass "celebrated by the priest in the Person of Christ in virtue of the power he received in the Sacrament of Order" was very clearly, unambiguously, and correctly expressed. Twelve days earlier, Pope Paul VI had signed the Apostolic Constitution in which he approved and imposed the new ritual of the ordination of deacon, priest, and bishop. In this book the author examines the new rite of ordination to the priesthood and exposes its differences with the former one used in the Roman rite for a number of centuries, enjoying the highest authority. There can be no doubt of the validity of the New Rite but there are certain features which the author deplores. A number of prayers and ceremonies have been suppressed which, in the Old Rite, served clearly to express the most essential character and duty of priesthood: to offer the Eucharistic Sacrifice of the Mass. This is a sign of a tendency which can be observed in other official liturgical innovations (not to mention illegal ones). It is a matter of great concern for many Catholics that this and similar things are done at a time when the sacrificial character of what is now commonly called the "celebration of the Eucharist" is questioned or even denied by many who do not leave the Catholic Church. Mr. Davies gives an impressive exposition of the facts and the meaning he attaches to them in the light of Trent, the Pontifical letter Apostolicae Curae of Pope Leo XIII, other official documents, and also the Canterbury Declaration on Ministry and Ordination in the Anglican and Catholic Churches. He rightly rejects the latter completely as a totally ambiguous document. This is a rich and scholarly book which should be in the hands of all who study post-conciliar developments in the official Roman Catholic Church, the Church of Christ. J. P. M. van der Ploeg, D.P. Nijmegen (Holland), 11 May 1978. NOTE: Professor van der Ploeg is a Doctor and Master of Sacred Theology, Doctor of Sacred Scripture, Professor of Old Testament Studies in the Catholic University of Nijmegen, Holland, a Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of the Netherlands, and a leading authority on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Works Cited: Some of the books referred to in the notes have been abbreviated as follows: AMO Anglican Methodist Unity----I, The Ordinal AOWF Anglican Orders----A Way Forward? E. Yarnold, S.J. (CTS, 1977). CCAO The Catholic Church and Anglican Orders, F. Clark, S.J. (CTS 1962). CCT Catechism of the Council of Trent, translated by McHugh and Callan (New York, 1934). CD Catholic Dictionary, Addis and Arnold (London, 1928). CDT A Catholic Dictionary of Theology, ed. J. Crehan, S.J. (London, 1962). CGO Crammer's Godly Order, M. Davies (Angelus Press, Kansas City [to be reprinted in 1994]). D Enchiridion Symbolorum Denzinger (31st edition). ESR Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Reformation, F. Clark, S.J., (Oxford, 1967). IAWA I Am With You Always, M. Davies (Neumann Press, 1986) LPE Lay Presidency at the Eucharist?, T. Lloyd (Grove Books, 1977). OIR The Ordinal and its Revision, P. Toon (Grove Books, 1974). PAC The Popes and the Ordinal, A. Barnes (London, 1896). PJC Pope John's Council, M. Davies (Angelus Press, Kansas City, 1992). QAO The Question of Anglican Ordinations, E. Estcourt (London, 1873). RMP The Reformation, the Mass, and the Priesthood, E. C. Messenger (2 vols., London, 1936). TCC The Teaching of the Catholic Church, ed. G. Smith (London, 1956). VAC A Vindication of the Bull "Apostolicae Curae", The Cardinal Archbishop and Bishops of the Province of Westminster (London, 1898). WP Why Priests? H. Küng (London, 1972). THE ORDER OF MELCHISEDECH A Defence of the Catholic Priesthood by Michael Davies 1979 AND 1993 Author's Introduction The Order of Melchisedech was first published in 1979 and was very soon out of print. There has been a continual demand for a second edition since that time, but it is only now in 1993, fourteen years later, that I have been able to complete all the revisions and additions necessary to make this possible. Each time that I thought that this had been done some new development would take place relating to one of the key topics in the book which necessitated yet further revision. All of these developments have vindicated a position that I adopted in the first edition, in some cases in a very dramatic manner. The Nature of the Priesthood On the occasion of Holy Thursday, 1979, Pope John Paul II sent a letter to the bishops and priests of the world reaffirming the traditional Catholic doctrine of the priesthood. I am much encouraged by the fact that the explanation of the priesthood given in this book, which remains unchanged from the first edition, corresponds exactly with the teaching of the Holy Father, and, like the teaching of His Holiness, is completely incompatible with that contained in the Agreed Statements of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC). ARCIC In March 1966 Pope Paul VI and the Archbishop of Canterbury agreed to initiate a serious ecumenical dialogue. This resulted in the establishment of ARCIC which published the Agreed Statements on the Eucharist, the Ministry, and Authority between 1971 and 1977. Elucidations intended to clarify the meaning of the Statements were also published, and the entire ARCIC output was combined in its Final Report in 1980. Chapters V & VI, unchanged from the first edition, analyse the ARCIC Statements on the Eucharist and the Ministry and condemn them as a betrayal of the Faith on the part of the Catholic delegates. In 1980 I was invited to meet Cardinal Seper, the Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (SCDF), who had read The Order of Melchisedech. The SCDF was charged with evaluating the ARCIC agreements, and, as I explain in Appendix VIII, I was able to provide the Cardinal with documentation proving beyond any possibility of doubt the ambiguous nature of the Agreed Statements which enabled the Catholic and Anglican delegates to interpret them in a contradictory manner. The Cardinal assured me that there was no possibility of his Congregation ratifying the ARCIC Statements. In May 1992 the SCDF under its new Prefect, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, published its observations on The Final Report, Cardinal Seper sadly having died in the interim. The SCDF Observations constituted a devastating critique of ARCIC which left the ecumenical bureaucracy shocked, shaken, and outraged. Where the Agreements on the Eucharist and the Ministry are concerned, the criticisms made by ARCIC are virtually identical to those found in Chapters V & VI of this book. The SCDF laid stress upon the unacceptability of formulations in the report which "are not sufficiently explicit and hence lend themselves to a twofold interpretation." But the ecumenical bureaucracy did not abandon hope. The SCDF Observations carried only the authority of the Congregation, albeit that it is exceeded only by that of the Pope himself. The verdict of the Pope would be delivered in a final response to ARCIC carrying the authority of the Holy See itself. In an effort designed to pressure the Pope into reversing the SCDF verdict, The Final Report was sent to all the hierarchies of the world for their evaluation. The ecumenical bureaucracy, with a confidence that proved to be well-founded, was confident that most contemporary Catholic bishops would side with ARCIC rather than the SCDF. As far as I have been able to discover, not a single hierarchy aligned itself with the SCDF and repudiated ARCIC. This included the hierarchy of England and Wales. Its endorsement of ARCIC must constitute its most shameful act of cowardice and compromise since the reign of Henry VIII, when St. John Fisher was the only bishop willing to die rather than acknowledge the king as "supreme head in earth of the Church of England". But on this occasion, whatever individual bishops may have said in private, there was not a single instance of public dissent from their collective endorsement of the ARCIC betrayal, even though upholding the faith would not have involved beheading, but only a Tablet editorial censuring a lack of ecumenical enthusiasm. Pope John Paul II could hardly have been placed in a more embarrassing situation. As an exponent of collegiality he had to decide between the SCDF and virtually every bishop in the world. But Our Lord has promised to be with His Church always, and, if anything, the official Vatican Response was even more devastating than that of the SCDF.