The end of the road is nowhere near being in sight yet, but solid progress is being made: this was the impression given by the communiqué and press conference that followed last week’s second meeting of the Anglican-Catholic joint preparatory commission, held at Huntercombe Manor, Taplow, Berks, from August 30th to September 3rd.

Indeed, the frequency of the commission’s meetings seems to be increasing: while the first meeting was held seven and a half months ago at Gazzada in northern Italy, it is hoped to hold the third meeting towards the end of December, at the most only four months hence. Where it will be held is not yet certain: it has to be some where near a large international airport, but the likelihood of fog at that time of year rules out London airport, and therefore England.

Following the week of talks at Gazzada last January, the Anglican/Roman Catholic joint preparatory commission for dialogue between the two Churches will hold its second meeting at Huntercombe Manor, Taplow, Berkshire, from August 30th to September 4th. In addition to all the delegates present at the Gazzada talks, the Catholic team will be strengthened by Bishop Butler, 0.S.B., auxiliary of Westminster, and Fr. Camillus Hay from Australia, while the Anglican team will also include Dr. H. R. McAdoo, Bishop of Ossory, Ferns, and Leighlin (Church of Ireland), and Dr. T. A. Mollegen (American Episcopalian), of the Protestant Episcopal Theological Seminary, Virginia. There will also be an observer from the World Council of Churches, Dr. Harding Meyer. The addition of a member of the Church of Ireland team would seem to be intended to answer the criticisms—voiced mainly by an Irish Jesuit writing in the Furrow — of the absence of any member of that Church from the Gazzada team.

Just before we went to press the first meeting of the Joint Preparatory Commission for dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion was concluded at Gazzada, Varese, in the north of Italy.

The Joint Preparatory Commission met at the conference centre at the Villa Cagnola; Gazzada near Milan from 9-13 January 1967. Pope Paul VI and Archbishop Michael Ramsey, following their meeting in Rome on 23/24 March 1966, affirmed:

“Their desire that all those Christians who belong to these two Communions may be animated by these same sentiments of respect esteem and fraternal love, and in order to help these develop to the full, they intend to inaugurate between the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion a serious dialogue which, founded on the gospels and on the ancient common traditions, may lead to that unity in truth, for which Christ prayed”.