Living and proclaiming the Catholic faith in the Church of England.

Mission Statement

photo of multicolored glass mosaic windowpane

Anglican Catholic Future is a network of parishes and individuals that seek to proclaim and embody the Catholic faith in the Church of England. It was launched in April 2013, and is working to build groups across the country.

Individuals and parishes are invited to express their support for the statement which follows, and keep in touch with ACF as it develops. We seek to complement rather than compete with existing Catholic groupings, which is why we are deliberately adopting a network model of association.

As Anglicans from across the Church of England who have been formed and nourished in the Catholic tradition, we have established a network to help to inspire and equip clergy and laity for the work of Christian mission and ministry rooted in Catholic practice, piety and theology. By returning to the fundamentals of the apostolic faith, but without recourse to political agendas and party rivalries, we seek the renewal and revitalisation of the church’s mission and apologetic proclamation.

ACF-icoThe Catholic identity of the Church of England has suffered a crisis stemming from a preoccupation with divisive issues. As a result the Catholic tradition in Anglicanism has become fragmented and nerveless. Many who hold this tradition dear feel that the time is right to rediscover our Catholic roots and values for the sake of the church’s witness in our land.

Following the imperatives that guided our Catholic forebears in the Church of England we will focus on theology, spirituality and the life of prayer, liturgy and worship, vocation and priesthood, ecumenism and social justice. We will seek to model a style of discipleship faithful to the riches of our tradition, which encourages us to be creative and credible, imaginative and generous.

Generosity requires dialogue with other Christian traditions, especially those with whom we share a common heritage of spiritual understanding within the Western Church. Such dialogue will be pursued in an eirenic rather than a combative spirit.

We believe that the time has come for the implicit Catholic identity of our church to be made explicit. We look back to the Oxford Movement and the tradition on which it was built, and forward to the revitalisation of our church and nation as we recall our secularising culture to its spiritual inheritance.