English and Welsh Catholics are celebrating 175 years since Pope Pius IX restored the Catholic hierarchy in England and Wales on Sept. 29, 1850.
“Our Diocese in 1850 was not the Diocese of today. Catholic life was slowly emerging from centuries of opposition and suppression,” Cardinal Vincent Nichols wrote in a letter that was read at Sunday Masses Sept. 28, according to the Catholic Church of England and Wales.
He later added, “Throughout it all, our mission has survived and been fruitful. Parish life has been established, giving stability in neighbourhoods, schools have been founded and give witness to our faith, failures and problems have been faced, and we have played our part in public life and communal effort.”
Catholics were persecuted in England and Wales off and on for centuries after King Henry VIII passed the Acts of Supremacy in 1534, which made the monarch head of the Church of England. During the 18th and 19th centuries, a series of laws loosened restrictions. In 1829, the Roman Catholic Relief Act made it legal for Catholics to serve in high office across the UK, but the monarch must be Anglican.
When Pope Pius IX restored the Catholic hierarchy in 1850, many Anglicans in England and Wales publicly objected. Queen Victoria supposedly asked, “Am I Queen of England, or am I not?” according to The Catholic Herald.
In the first 15 years after the Catholic hierarchy was restored, Catholics in England and Wales opened 45 churches and many Catholic schools, according to The Catholic Herald. Westminster Cathedral was completed in 1903.
Today, Catholicism is experiencing a resurgence across the UK. As CatholicVote previously reported, Catholics could soon outnumber Anglicans there for the first time since King Henry VIII first created the Anglican Church. Among 18-34 year-olds, those regularly attending religious services are more than twice as likely to be Catholic as Anglican, according to Reuters.
In his letter, Cardinal Nichols noted that today England and Wales are far more diverse than they were in 1850. He said that, for Catholics, these differences matter far less than a common faith in Jesus Christ.
“What binds us together, of course, is not our taste in food, nor in music, nor in pathways of piety or devotion,” he wrote. “Rather, it is what lies at the heart of our faith: our intimate and shared love for Jesus, the Christ. He is the one who, in His life, death, and resurrection, gives joy to our days, forgiveness for our darkness, and hope for eternal life when our pilgrimage here is done.”
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