Fr. John Fullerton
District Superior, USA

Dear Reader, The recent passing of Queen Elizabeth II on September 8, 2022 turned the world’s eyes toward the United Kingdom and its monarchical history—a history replete with fraught relations between the Catholic Church and the Crown. Those relations began to improve ever so slightly in the years leading up to the reign of Elizabeth’s great-great grandmother, Victoria. When she ascended the throne in 1837, British Catholics were enjoying nearly a decade of having many of their civil rights restored through the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829.

During the so-called Victorian Era, Pope Pius IX reinstated the Catholic hierarchy in 1850 with 13 sees and the Archdiocese of Westminster. Not since the reign of Mary Tudor in 1855 had England seen a normal Catholic ecclesiastical organization. The “Oxford Movement,” which sought to return the schismatic Church of England to its Apostolic roots, picked up steam before its most talented and visible proponent, John Henry Newman, left Protestantism behind for the Catholic Faith. Joining Newman were a slew of other high-minded Anglicans, including the future Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, Henry Edward Manning.

In this issue of The Angelus, we look at the prevalent cultural currents during the Victorian Era with particular attention paid to Catholicism’s role during it. While the advancements made by the Church during this period were laudable and laid the groundwork for the British Catholic intellectual revival of the early 20th century, many of its fruits have been lost in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, which opened 60 years ago.

Let us pray that, in God’s good time, Catholicism regains its foothold in England so that the Gospel may again reign in the homeland of so many saintly missionaries, hierarchs, and martyrs.

Fr. John Fullerton