Anyone find the complete homily? I looked but couldn't find it.
Also, is this bad to say here but why don't the ACP just become Episcopalians and leave the RC to traditional Catholics. Mind you I'm not either RC or Episcopalian so I don't have a dog in the fight but I think is a fair question.
Well, for one thing, the organization in question is based in the nation of Ireland. There is a Church of Ireland that is affiliated with the same Anglican Communion that the Episcopal Church (US) and the Church of England (England) are part of, but for historical reasons many Irish Catholics who still live in Ireland are not going to want to become affiliated with the Church of England in any way (Even by proxy). Catholic vs. Protestant is to some extent cultural around the world, but especially so in Ireland and Northern Ireland. The English occupied the island for so long against the will of the populace and was complicit in atrocities like the potato famine of the 19th century and the Blood Sunday Massacre of the 20th century that there is a lot going on there beyond just a set of religious beliefs and practices. People don't start wearing orange (Figuratively speaking) without thinking about it very hard, thinking about it very hard again from the top, and then thinking about it a third time, and then- well, let's just say it doesn't often happen.
Now, of course, many Anglican and Episcopalian communities consider themselves Catholic as well as Protestant, and it's true that the Church of England traces itself back to the early Celtic Church (Celts are the ethnic group that Irish people and Scots are essentially a part of- the English have a little bit of that left, but are mostly Anglo-Saxon) and is the descendent (Along with the Roman Catholic Church- long story) of the local church that St. Patrick returned to Ireland from as a missionary, so the transition you describe may be something that should not be rejected out of hand, but tell that to the Irish.
It's just not going to fly there, is my sense. I'm sure it happens occasionally.
Anyway, in a broader sense, around the world, progressive Catholics often do switch from the Roman Catholic Church (or other Anglican provinces) to the Episcopal Church, and conservative Anglicans often convert to Roman Catholicism. The traditions are very similar in many respects and it is not necessarily a hard transition to make if you don't have a situation like the people in the Republic of Ireland have going on.
*However*, obviously there is a strain of Protestantism as well as Catholicism going on in Anglican churches, and those churches have their own unique traditions and customs that are in some ways different from the Roman Catholic Church, so i some sense it's hard to say it's a straight-forward progressive version of the Roman Catholic Church. Sometimes it's close, but there are some distinctions.
It can also be hard if you've been a priest in a certain church and your family has been in that church for centuries, and you believe in things like Papal primacy, the authority of, for example, the Vatican II Council, and such to make a break and go to a Church with no Pope that wasn't part of Vatican II (Even if it may better follow through on the movement it started, in one's opinion), and so on and so forth. Loyalty to at least the concept of the Pope has been a key mark of Roman Catholicism that has increased through the years- the factions that were very iffy on it left during the Reformation, by and large. Also, depending on the Anglican province and whether you can find a parish with an Anglo-Catholic lean, things like Eucharistic Adoration and May Crownings may or may not be available, etc..
People also sometimes see some value in staying and fighting. Some people who were officially silenced or whatever were later named Saints. Joan of Arc was even burned as a heretic- and she's a Saint now. People, and I think especially sometimes priests, understand that sometimes things are cyclical and that by staying put and carrying their cross, they can make an impact- it may not seem like they are making one in their own lifetimes, but maybe what they did inspired the people who will make an impact in the next generation, or inspired the person who inspired the person, etc.. And sometimes they themselves get recognized later.
We can see now, for instance, a significant difference between Pope Benedict and Pope Francis, but that isn't necessarily even as far as it could go. People have hope.
Actually, I've long sort toyed with the idea that we might need a schism from the left that sets up an alternate Roman Catholic Church structure without any Protestant trappings, but right now what I am seeing is that there is a chance there may be a schism from the right far bigger than the SSPX schism, and if there is, the remnant main Roman Catholic Church may move to the left simply because the right-wing forces are no longer there to prevent reforms in a leftward direction or to consider the pastoral impact of reforms on. That's a little far-fetched, but stranger things have happened in the last 2,000 years of Church history.
Anyway, your suggestion is not a bad one, and sometimes it's exactly what happens. However, as you can see above, it's a bit more complex than that. It's not really the same as, say, a progressive Lutheran leaving the LCMS and joining ELCA, or a conservative Lutheran going the other way. There are a lot of psychological barriers for Roman Catholics formally breaking from Rome, even when they disagree with Rome. It's a bigger harder step- one people sometimes go back and forth on and struggle with their whole lives (I remember the story of someone ordained a Roman Catholic priest who eventually became an Episcopalian bishop. I think he may have even been born Episcopalian, convert to Roman Catholicism and become a priest, and then gone back to the Episcopal Church as a priest and eventually go consecrated a bishop. He several times flip-flopped in semi-retirement years between communions to the point where you'd see comment sections under articles going "Oh, this again.". It was sort of amusing or odd to a point, but it underlines a struggle a lot of people have, which is that their Roman Catholicism never really totally leaves them, and even when they make a break, sometimes there is this strong pull back every so often that is hard to resist- the old one true Church Catholic guilt stuff.).
Other people make the move, are happy with it, and never look back.
