Archbishop of Westminster

With the gradual abolition of the legal restrictions on the activities of Catholics in England and Wales in the early 19th century, Rome on its own ("not by Concordat with the British government nor conversations with the Anglican Church") decided to fill the partial vacuum, which Queen Elizabeth I had created, by restoring Catholic dioceses on a regular historical pattern and replacing existing titular bishops or vicars apostolic with diocesan ones. Thus Pope Pius IX issued the bull Universalis Ecclesiae of 29 September 1850 by which thirteen new dioceses were created. Although these dioceses could not formally claim pre-Elizabethan territorial dioceses (owing to the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829), they did claim validity and continuity with the pre-Elizabethan Church.[6][7] Historian and descendant of recusants, Paul Johnson, claims that as early as 1718, only 30 years after the Glorious Revolution, Catholics could take heart when Parliament repealed the Schism Act, the Occasional Conformity Act and the Act for Quieting and Establishing Corporations, which allowed Dissenters to hold certain offices. Although these repeals at the time only benefited Dissenters, their rescission and abolition suggested reform was in the air and on Parliament's mind. Then in 1727, in the wake of the repeal of the annual Indemnity Acts, which relieved Dissenters of most of their civil disabilities (making it no longer possible, for example, to enforce by law the attendance of anyone at church on Sunday), Catholics, especially non-aristocratic Catholics, could slowly start to creep out into the open again, long before the Catholic Emancipation of 1832. As a result of the 1727 Act, Christianity in England (Anglican, Dissenters, Catholic, etc.) also ceased to be a "compulsory society". Still, Catholics had to wait another 95 years before being given full civil and religious rights. Nevertheless, the gains of the Dissenters a century earlier were a significant step towards eliminating Catholic disabilities later.[8]

The Ecclesiastical Titles Act had already been proposed by the British Parliament and was passed in 1851 as an anti-Catholic measure precisely to prevent any newly created Catholic dioceses from taking existing Anglican diocesan names, forbidding the wearing of (Anglican) clerical dress or setting bells in Catholic places of worship. It was repealed by Gladstone in 1871.

One of these newly restored dioceses was the Diocese of Westminster, the sole Metropolitan See at that time. However, under Pope Pius X, on 28 October 1911, the provinces of Liverpool and Birmingham were created, and Westminster retained as suffragan dioceses only Northampton, Nottingham, Portsmouth and Southwark. These increased when under Pope Benedict XV a bull of 20 July 1917, fixed the seat of a new diocese corresponding to the County of Essex, detached now from Westminster, at Brentwood, making it a suffragan of Westminster.

During the pontificate of Pope Paul VI, on 28 May 1965, the Province of Southwark was erected, with as its suffragans Portsmouth, detached from Westminster, Plymouth, detached from Birmingham, and the diocese of Arundel and Brighton erected in the counties of Sussex and Surrey with territory taken from the diocese of Southwark. Westminster retained as suffragan dioceses only Northampton, Nottingham and Brentwood. Subsequently these were joined by a new diocese of East Anglia, elected with territory from the Northampton diocese in the counties of Cambridge, Norfolk and Suffolk by Paul VI on 13 March 1976.

The previous Catholic jurisdiction of the London area was headed by the Vicar Apostolic of the London District or titular bishop, appointed by the pope.

Westminster Cathedral from Victoria Street

The diocese presently covers an area of 3,634 km² (1,403 sq miles) of the London Boroughs north of the River Thames excluding Barking & Dagenham, Havering, Newham, Redbridge and Waltham Forest together with the districts of Staines-upon-Thames and Sunbury-on-Thames and the County of Hertfordshire. The see is in the City of Westminster, the Archbishop's cathedra or seat is located at the Metropolitan Cathedral Church of the "Most Precious Holy Blood, Saint Mary, Saint Joseph and Saint Peter", usually referred to as Westminster Cathedral, which is set back from Victoria Street.

The Archbishop's residence is Archbishop's House, Ambrosden Avenue, London.

Vincent Cardinal Nichols was installed as the 11th archbishop on 21 May 2009.[9] He was elevated to cardinal on 22 February 2014, becoming the 43rd English cardinal since the 12th century.

Among the old European Catholic sees, the Archbishop of Westminster is referred to as the Primate of England and Wales. However, in the United Kingdom, this is not legally correct, since the title is formally claimed only by the archbishops of the established Church of England, and is applied to the Archbishop of York as "Primate of England", and the Archbishop of Canterbury, as "Primate of All England". In global Catholicism, however, the last time there was an elected Catholic primate of England in Great Britain, accepted by the state, was prior to the Elizabethan phase of the Reformation. However, the papal bull Si qua est of 1911, which separated the provinces of Birmingham and Liverpool from Westminster, included the provision:

"Insuper Archiepiscopo Westmonasteriensi pro tempore exsistenti novae quaedam accèdent ad regiminis actionisque unitatem servandam praerogativae quae tribus hisce capitibus continentur, nempe: 1. Praeses ipse erit perpetuus collationum episcopalium totius Angliae et Cambriae; ob eamque rem ipsius erit conventus indicere eisque praeesse iuxta normas in Italia et alibi vigentes; 2.Primo gaudebit loco super aliis duobus Archiepiscopis nec non pallii et cathedrae usu atque praeferendae crucis privilegio in universa Anglia et Cambria; 3. denique totius Ordinis Episcoporum Angliae et Cambriae regionis personam ipse geret coram suprema civili potestate, semper tamen auditis omnibus Episcopis quorum maioris partis sententias sequi debet."[10]

Which translates into:

"Moreover, for the preservation of unity in government and policy, to the Archbishop of Westminster are granted certain new distinctions of pre-eminence. He will be permanent chairman at the meetings of the bishops of all England and Wales...he will take rank above the other two archbishops, and will, throughout all England and Wales, enjoy the privilege of wearing the pallium, of occupying the throne, and of having the cross carried before him. Lastly, in all dealings with the supreme civil authority, he will in his person represent the entire episcopate of England and Wales."

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