First Welsh former Anglican bishop joins Ordinariate

He will be received by the Rt Rev. Keith Newton, the Ordinary of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham and a member of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales.

Mgr Newton said: “We are delighted that after much prayer Richard has asked to be received into the full communion of the Catholic Church.

“He will be the first bishop from the Anglican Church in Wales to be received into the Ordinariate since its creation in 2011.

“Richard has a long and distinguished ministry in the Church in Wales. He has many gifts which he will continue to use to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to the people of Wales.”

Bishop Pain said: ‘Having retired from episcopal ministry three years ago, I have had time to reflect on the retiree’s perennial question — what next?

“The process of discernment continues throughout life and is constantly shaped by context but more importantly by the whisper of God’s voice.

“The Benedictine understanding of obedience — hearing the Lord- has been significant to my personal formation.

“The call to conversion which follows has led me to becoming a convert to the Catholic Church through the Ordinariate.”

He continued: “I have much to be grateful for the experience gained over a lifetime as an Anglican.

“Yet the call to Catholicism seems natural and spiritual at the same time. To start afresh will be a welcome challenge and I come — as we all do — as a learner and a disciple.

“The Ordinariate, through the vision of Pope Benedict, provides a generous pathway to walk a pilgrim way and I ask for your prayers.’

Bishop Pain was born in London in 1956 and attended Bristol University where he studied English Literature before receiving his second degree in Theology at University of Wales, Cardiff, whilst training for the Anglican ministry.

He was ordained in the Church in Wales at Newport Cathedral in 1986 and has served all his ministry in the Diocese of Monmouth, working in the valleys as well as in the heart of Monmouthshire.

He served as Vicar of Monmouth, then as Archdeacon of Monmouth and was elected Bishop of Monmouth in 2013.

He spent many years in the discernment and training of clergy and was lead bishop for ministry in the Church in Wales and was chair of the St Padarn’s Institute at its formation in 2016.

Bishop Pain has been married to Juliet for more than 40 years and they have two sons. He enjoys photography and the classical guitar.

The Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham is a structure similar to a diocese, inaugurated under the late Pope Benedict XVI to allow former Anglicans to enter the full communion of the Catholic Church whilst retaining some elements of the Anglican tradition that nurtured its members.

It has its own Eucharistic liturgy which preserves some elements of the Book of Common Prayer.

Bishop Pain is the latest in a string of high-profile converts to the Catholic faith from the Anglican clergy.

Jonathan Goodall, the former Bishop of Ebbsfleet, was ordained a diocesan priest in Westminster Cathedral, and former Anglican Bishop of Rochester Michael Nazir-Ali has become a priest of the Ordinariate.

Fr Nazir-Ali was the first former diocesan — as opposed to suffragan, area or “flying” — Anglican bishop to be received into the Catholic Church since Bishop Graham Leonard of London and Bishop Richard Rutt of Leicester in 1994.

The retired Bishop of Chester, Peter Forster, was received into the Catholic faith in autumn 2021, while Catholic Herald associate editor Dr Gavin Ashenden, a former chaplain to the Queen and a traditionalist Anglican bishop, became a Catholic in Shrewsbury Cathedral at Christmas 2019.

Mgr John Goddard, the former Bishop of Burnley, was received into the Catholic faith in May 2021 by Auxiliary Bishop Tom Williams of Liverpool and ordained a priest in the Lutyens Chapel of the Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool, in April last year.

Pope Francis elevated Mgr Goddard, a married father-of-two, to the status of a personal “chaplain” within six months of his ordination as a priest for the Archdiocese of Liverpool in recognition of his 50 years of service in the Church of England.

First Welsh former Anglican bishop joins Ordinariate

By Simon Caldwell
THE CATHOLIC HERALD
June 15, 2023

A Welsh former Anglican bishop has announced his decision to be received into the Catholic Church.

The Rt Rev. Richard Pain, who retired as Bishop of Monmouth in 2019, will become the sixth Anglican bishop in the UK to cross the Tiber in the last four years, but the first from Wales.

He will be received into the full communion of the Catholic Church within the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham on Sunday July 2 at the Church of St Basil and St Gwladys, Rogerstone, Newport.