Editing Ancient British Church

{{Short description|British religious movement}}
{{Distinguish|Ancient British Church in North America|Christianity in Britain|Celtic Christianity}}
The '''Ancient British Church''' was a British [[Sociological classifications of religious movements|religious movement]] supposedly founded in the 19th century by [[Jules Ferrette]] ([[Mar (title)|Mar]] Julius) and [[Richard Williams Morgan]] (Mar Pelagius).<ref name="Pearson2007">{{cite book|last=Pearson|first=Joanne|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Au_paUclEZkC&pg=PA166|title=Wicca and the Christian Heritage: ritual, sex and magic|date=27 June 2007|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0-415-25413-7|pages=|access-date=9 November 2012}}</ref> The Ancient British Church ceased to exist in 1944.

==Foundation==

[[Jules Ferrette]] was ordained a [[Roman Catholic]] priest in 1855. The next year, he left the Roman Catholic Church and became a Presbyterian minister and missionary.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Series|first=Evangelical Christendom:Its State and Prospects VOL III-New|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7QYFAAAAQAAJ&dq=%22jules+ferrette%22+%22presbyterian%22&pg=PA584|title=Evangelical Christendom:Its State and Prospects VOL.III-New Series|date=1862|pages=584|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Pruter|first=Karl|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l79xM4Cxde0C&dq=%22jules+ferrette%22+%22presbyterian%22&pg=PA38|title=The Old Catholic Church, Third Edition|date=2006-10-01|publisher=Wildside Press LLC|isbn=978-0-912134-41-3|pages=38|language=en|author-link=Karl Pruter}}</ref><ref name=":1" />{{Rp|pages=34}} He worked for the [[Irish Presbyterian Mission]] in [[Damascus]] from 1858 to 1865, and assisted [[Frederick Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, 1st Marquess of Dufferin and Ava|Frederick Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood]]'s Mission to the poor Christians of [[Mount Lebanon]] from 1860 to 1862.<ref name=":1" />{{Rp|pages=34}} In 1866, he came back from Damascus to England, and claimed he had been [[Episcopal consecration|ordained bishop]] "Mar Julius, Bishop of [[Iona]]" by a bishop of the [[Syriac Orthodox Church|Syrian Jacobite Church]], [[Ignatius Peter IV|Mar Bedros]] of [[Emesa]]. No proof of Ferrette's episcopal consecration exists, despite Ferrette showing a printed document "which he claimed was a translation [in English] of his certificate of consecration, dated 22 June 1866 ([[Old Style and New Style dates|Old Style]])."<ref name="Pearson20074">{{cite book|last=Pearson|first=Joanne|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Au_paUclEZkC&pg=PA166|title=Wicca and the Christian Heritage: ritual, sex and magic|date=27 June 2007|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0-415-25413-7|pages=34|access-date=9 November 2012}}</ref>

Allegedly, in [[Oxfordshire]] some time after 1858, [[Richard Williams Morgan]], an [[Anglican]] priest, was [[Conditional sacrament|conditionally]] "baptised, confirmed, ordained and consecrated" Patriarch of the Ancient British Church by Ferrette, and given by him the full title Mar Pelagius I, Hierarch of Caerleon-on-Usk.<ref name="Pearson20072">{{cite book|last=Pearson|first=Joanne|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Au_paUclEZkC&pg=PA166|title=Wicca and the Christian Heritage: ritual, sex and magic|date=27 June 2007|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0-415-25413-7|pages=34–6|access-date=9 November 2012}}</ref> Jules Ferrette died in 1903.<ref name="Pearson20074" />

==Continuation==
{{Further|Jules Ferrette#Apostolic succession claims}}
The church continued after Morgan's death. Pearson describes the organisation as having "always remained rather shadowy, rather an idea than a community".<ref name="Pearson20076">{{cite book|last=Pearson|first=Joanne|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Au_paUclEZkC&pg=PA166|title=Wicca and the Christian Heritage: ritual, sex and magic|date=27 June 2007|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0-415-25413-7|pages=36|access-date=9 November 2012}}</ref> Supposedly, Morgan consecrated a successor, [[Charles Isaac Stevens]], in 1879.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Anson |first=Peter F. |title=Bishops at Large |publisher=Apocryphile press |year=2006 |isbn=0-9771461-8-9 |series=Independent Catholic Heritage |chapter=Jules Ferrette, Mar Julius, Bishop of Iona, and alleged Patriarchal Legate of the Syrian Jacobite Church for Western Europe |author-link=Peter Anson |orig-year=1964}}</ref>{{Rp|pages=46}}<ref name="Pearson20076" /> Supposedly, Stevens consecrated around 1890 a successor in the person of [[Leon Chechemian]], an alleged [[Armenians|Armenian]] [[vardapet]], who allegedly at this consecration was given the religious name Mar Leon.<ref name="Pearson20076" /><ref name=":4">{{Cite book|last=Anson|first=Peter F.|title=Bishops at Large|publisher=Apocryphile press|year=2006|isbn=0-9771461-8-9|series=Independent Catholic Heritage|pages=218–20|chapter=Churches Claiming the Ferrette Succession|orig-year=1964}}</ref>

== Dissolution ==
By a declaration dated 23 March 1944, the Ancient British Church, the British Orthodox Catholic Church, and the Old Catholic Orthodox Church merged; the official name of the new church was: "The Western Orthodox Catholic Church". This church was made the [[Catholicate of the West]] by its Patriarch Abdullah III ([[William Bernard Crow]]). No church of the East gave its recognition to the Catholicate.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Anson|first=Peter F.|title=Bishops at Large|publisher=Apocryphile press|year=2006|isbn=0-9771461-8-9|series=Independent Catholic Heritage|pages=242–3, 448|chapter=|orig-year=1964}}</ref>

The first [[Catholicos]] of the West, head of the Catholicate of the West, was [[Hugh George de Willmott Newman]]. He was consecrated as this status by Abdullah III on 10 April 1944 under the name and title: Mar Georgius, Archbishop and Metropolitan of the Holy [[Metropolis (religious jurisdiction)|Metropolis]] of Glastonbury, the Occidental [[Jerusalem]], and [[Catholicos]] of the West. Thereafter, Mar Jacobus II stepped down from his office of fifth Patriarch of the Ancient British Church, passing his rank of Patriarch to Willmott Newman; thus Willmott Newman was both Catholicos of the West and the sixth Patriarch of the Ancient British Church. Mar Jacobus II died in 1947.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Anson|first=Peter F.|title=Bishops at Large|publisher=Apocryphile press|year=2006|isbn=0-9771461-8-9|series=Independent Catholic Heritage|pages=243, 449–50|chapter=|orig-year=1964}}</ref>

== Ideology ==
Morgan and Ferrette planned the movement as an attempt to restore a form of [[Christianity]] in Britain that they called [[Neo-Celtic Christianity]].<ref name="Thomann2001">{{cite book|author=Günther H. Thomann|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2PXicQAACAAJ|title=A Short Biography of the Reverend Richard Williams Morgan (c.: 1815-1889), the Welsh poet and re-founder of the Ancient British Church: An enquiry into the origins of neo-Celtic Christianity, together with a reprint of several works by Richard Williams Morgan and Jules Ferrette, etc|publisher=St. Ephrem's Inst.|year=2001|access-date=9 November 2012}}</ref> Morgan claimed that Christianity in Britain existed in a [[syncretistic]], [[druid]]ic form prior to the entry of [[Augustine of Canterbury]].<ref name="Pearson20075">{{cite book|last=Pearson|first=Joanne|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Au_paUclEZkC&pg=PA166|title=Wicca and the Christian Heritage: ritual, sex and magic|date=27 June 2007|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0-415-25413-7|pages=35|access-date=9 November 2012}}</ref>

The publications of [[John Williams (Ab Ithel)]],<ref name="Pearson2007" /> [[Iolo Morganwg]],<ref name="Löffler2007">{{cite book|author=Marion Löffler|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TIBnAAAAMAAJ|title=The literary and historical legacy of Iolo Morganwg, 1826-1926|publisher=University of Wales Press|year=2007|isbn=978-0-7083-2113-3|access-date=10 November 2012}}</ref> Morgan and Ferrette influenced the movement.<ref name="Thomann2001" />

==See also==
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* [[Celtic Revival]]
{{div col end}}

==References==
{{Reflist|2}}

[[Category:Christian new religious movements]]
[[Category:Celtic Christianity]]
[[Category:Religious organizations disestablished in 1944]]
[[Category:Religious organizations established in the 1800s]]