The Pastoral Provision was allowed to totter on for 22 years—-indeed technically the congregation of St Athanasius, Chestnut Hill is still a PP parish. Why is the CDF taking a hard line with the Australian ordinariate? Why not just allow it to die a natural death? Is the whole ordinariate project being seen, belatedly, as a bad look for the Church?The passing of the project's most powerful patron, Cdl Law, and the retirement of Pope Benedict XVI mean that the opportunity for reassessment is growing. Insofar as the talent pool even in the US is mainly marginal ex-Protetant clergy, I think bishops would be correct in having a concern that people who walk into an ordinariate parish that calls itself a "Catholic church" don't get a consistent product.If the plan is to make the ordinariates justify their existence, the UK will be next in the crosshairs. It has one building to its name, no stipendiary clergy apart from those in local diocesan employ, and as we have often discussed is the least interested in maintaining Anglican liturgical patrimony, since most of its clergy used the OF even when in the CofE.
Its financial resources are few and it has failed to grow; indeed the latest data at catholic-hierarchy.org from the Annuario Pontificio shows that its membership has declined by about half since 2014-16 and it has lost five communities since its high point in 2014. For purposes of comparison, the Australian ordinariate had 1,200 members in 2019.
With an official membership of 6,040 the US ordinariate is twice as big as the other two Ordinariates combined. It has some buildings and some money. But if the project is coming under scrutiny in Rome we know that there is plenty of cause for concern in Houston as well.
For now, thouigh, the bishops have other priorities -- a scandal couild change that. The situation at St Barnabas Omaha is an indication that parishes aren't well supervised, and serious problems aren't addressed before they're out of control.
