Peter Donald Wilkinson (born 1940) is a Canadian Roman Catholic priest. He was formerly a

bishop A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of di ...

in the

Anglican Catholic Church of Canada The Anglican Catholic Church of Canada (ACCC) () is a Continuing Anglican church that was founded in 1979 by traditional Anglicans who had separated from the Anglican Church of Canada. The ACCC has fifteen parishes and missions; with two bishops a ...

, a

Continuing Anglican The Continuing Anglican movement, also known as the Anglican Continuum, encompasses a number of Christian churches, principally based in North America, that have an Anglican identity and tradition but are not part of the Anglican Communion. The ...

church within the Traditional Anglican Communion. He was received into the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

in 2012 and was ordained a Catholic priest and serves within the

Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter The Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter () is a Latin Church ecclesiastical jurisdiction or personal ordinariate of the Catholic Church for Anglican (Episcopal) converts in the United States and Canada. Former members of communions ...

Early life and education

Born in

Victoria, British Columbia Victoria is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of British Columbia, on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific Ocean, Pacific coast. The city has a population of 91,867, and the Gre ...

, Wilkinson grew up in his hometown located on the southern tip of

Vancouver Island Vancouver Island is an island in the northeastern Pacific Ocean and part of the Canadian province of British Columbia. The island is in length, in width at its widest point, and in total area, while are of land. The island is the largest ...

. As a teenager, he was impressed by

Anglo-Catholic Anglo-Catholicism comprises beliefs and practices that emphasise the Catholicism, Catholic heritage (especially pre-English Reformation, Reformation roots) and identity of the Church of England and various churches within Anglicanism. Anglo-Ca ...

liturgy and provided services to the

Christ Church Cathedral (Vancouver) Christ Church Cathedral in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, is the cathedral church of the Anglican Diocese of New Westminster of the Anglican Church of Canada, and the second church to have been the diocese's cathedral. A List of places of w ...

, then entered the university, and became more interested in religious life and decided to seek ordination to the priesthood. After graduating, Wilkinson received a permit from the Anglican bishop of British Columbia to enter an Anglo-Catholic seminary in England run by the

Community of the Resurrection The Community of the Resurrection (CR) is an Anglican religious community for men in England. It is based in Mirfield, West Yorkshire, and has 14 members as of April 2023. The community reflects Anglicanism in its broad nature and is strongl ...

religious order. In 1965, he was ordained and became a member of the order.

Departure from the Anglican Communion

As a priest in England, in 1968 Wilkinson had what he calls a ''

zeitgeist In 18th- and 19th-century German philosophy, a ''Zeitgeist'' (; ; capitalized in German) is an invisible agent, force, or daemon dominating the characteristics of a given epoch in world history. The term is usually associated with Georg W. F ...

''. Unhappy with the evolution of the

liturgy Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, remembra ...

and English society, he left England and returned to Canada, convinced that the Anglican Diocese of British Columbia would welcome him. However, he was rejected because of his Catholic views. In addition, he realized that the changes that took place in England were also happening in Canada: women ordained as priests, the church recognized divorced and remarried people and "gender neutral" language was becoming common in liturgies. In 1977, Wilkinson left the

Anglican Communion The Anglican Communion is a Christian Full communion, communion consisting of the Church of England and other autocephalous national and regional churches in full communion. The archbishop of Canterbury in England acts as a focus of unity, ...

to join the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC), a church influenced by the

Oxford Movement The Oxford Movement was a theological movement of high-church members of the Church of England which began in the 1830s and eventually developed into Anglo-Catholicism. The movement, whose original devotees were mostly associated with the Un ...

, including the writings of

John Henry Newman John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English Catholic theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer, and poet. He was previously an Anglican priest and after his conversion became a cardinal. He was an ...

, and the thinking of Cardinal

Joseph Ratzinger Pope BenedictXVI (born Joseph Alois Ratzinger; 16 April 1927 – 31 December 2022) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 19 April 2005 until his resignation on 28 February 2013. Benedict's election as po ...

. On 21 October 1999, Wilkinson was consecrated as a bishop and wrote to Cardinal Ratzinger to explain that "the basis of his teaching is the

catechism of the Catholic Church The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' (; commonly called the ''Catechism'' or the ''CCC'') is a reference work that summarizes the Catholic Church's doctrine. It was Promulgation (Catholic canon law), promulgated by Pope John Paul II in 1992 ...

" and "his desire to return to full communion with the

Holy See The Holy See (, ; ), also called the See of Rome, the Petrine See or the Apostolic See, is the central governing body of the Catholic Church and Vatican City. It encompasses the office of the pope as the Bishops in the Catholic Church, bishop ...

". The future Pope Benedict XVI replied and sent him an autographed copy of his book ''The Spirit of the Liturgy''. On 10 January 2005, upon the retirement of then Bishop Robert W. S. Mercer, CR, Wilkinson became metropolitan bishop of the

Reception into the Roman Catholic Church

In 2007, he participated in the synod of the Traditional Anglican Communion which unanimously voted for full communion with Rome. In 2009, Pope Benedict XVI published the apostolic constitution '' Anglicanorum coetibus''. In November 2011, Wilkinson became bishop of the Our Lady of Walsingham Ordinariate, composed of clergy and parishes who were preparing to enter the

. In January 2012 the Pope created the

. Thus, after 50 years of priesthood and almost 13 years as bishop in the Anglican tradition, Wilkinson became a Roman Catholic as a layman. On April 15, he made his profession of faith and received communion for the first time as a Catholic, along with

Carl Reid Carl Leonard Reid (born 14 December 1950 in Hagersville, Ontario, Canada) is a Canadian Roman Catholic priest, who was the ordinary of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of the Southern Cross in Australia until 21 April 2023 when his resigna ...

, at a ceremony officiated by Monsignor Richard Gagnon at St Andrew's Cathedral in Victoria. On 8 December, the feast of the

Immaculate Conception The Immaculate Conception is the doctrine that the Virgin Mary was free of original sin from the moment of her conception. It is one of the four Mariology, Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Debated by medieval theologians, it was not def ...

, he was ordained as a priest of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter, administered by Monsignor Jeffrey Steenson. A month later, the Pope appointed Wilkinson a Prelate of Honor, thus granting him the title of "

monsignor Monsignor (; ) is a form of address or title for certain members of the clergy in the Catholic Church. Monsignor is the apocopic form of the Italian ''monsignore'', meaning "my lord". "Monsignor" can be abbreviated as Mons.... or Msgr. In some ...

". He served in the Church of Saint Columba of Iona in Victoria — a small wooden parish church for a century and leased to Anglicans — until 2014, when he officially retired himself.catholicworldreport.com
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilkinson, Peter 1940 births Living people Anglican bishop converts to Roman Catholicism Canadian Anglo-Catholics 21st-century Canadian Roman Catholic priests People from Victoria, British Columbia