RETURNING TO THE FOLD

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 27, Issue 21, 27 May 1909, Page 819

RETURNING TO THE FOLD

An announcement which had been made by the Pall Moll Gazette with regard to the conversion of the Anglican Sisterhood at St. Katharine's, Queen's square, London, W.C., was circulated widely by the press and made a sensation not only in the Metropolis, but throughout the whole country. The paper's statement was that the entire community Avas formally received into the Catholic Church on Thursday, April 1, by a French priest, that Mass was said that day in the chapel, that the Archbishop of Westminster has permitted the nuns to continue to wear their own distinctive dress, and that the institution will still bo called St. Katharine's Convent. Naturally, the details given by the journals in which tho news has appeared, vary (says the Catholic Times). Nearly all of the reports are more or less incorrect. The convent was opened forty years ago as a branch of the East Grinstead Anglican Community. A representative of the Catholic Times learns that a few years ago the convent separated from the Mother House. The doctrines and ritual of the Catholic Church had much attraction for some of the nuns, aud recognising more and more definitely that union with the Holy See is an essential of true Catholicity, they gradually came to entertain the idea of entering the Catholic fold. The result was that this step was decided on in a number of cases within the past year. In the course of the twelve months six Sisters and ten embroidery school workers came into the Church. The event, of course, had a considerable influence. The converts, steadfast and true -in their loyalty to the Catholic faith, set an example by which the thoughts and views of others must have been affected. At any rate, in December the Superioress, Mother Ellen Mary, was received into the Church by Abbot Cabrol, of Farnborough, and became, instead of the head of an Anglican community, a Benedictine Abbess. Permission has since been received from Rome for the celebration of Mass and the reservation of the Blessed Sacrament in the convent, and on Thursday, April 1, Abbot Cabrol said Mass for the first time at the institution. It. need scarcely be said that at present the reporters are eager to make ' copy ' out of what has taken place, and that the disposition of the converts is to cultivate retirement and silence.