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The Malines Conversations Group met for its twelfth annual residential meeting at the ecumenical monastery at Bose, Piedmont between Saturday 25th April and Thursday 30th April 2026. With the Italian Alps as a stunning backdrop to our meeting, we were greatly honoured to enjoy the generous hospitality of the Bose community, with their friendship and presence at our meals, and with the warm welcome extended to us by all of them and especially by the prior, Sabino Chialà. Our thanks go to him, and to all his brothers and sisters. We were specially privileged to be able to join them at their daily worship throughout our meeting. The combination of corporate prayer and worship, friendship and the natural beauty of the monastery’s setting gave our meeting a special character.
This year for various reasons our physical meeting was a little smaller than previous years, but several of our members and companions were able to join us online for our main sessions, and again we are grateful for the assistance of the community in enabling that to happen. We were joined in person by Dr Andrej Jeftic, Director of the Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches, by Brother Guido Dotti of the Bose community, and by the Rt Revd Bruce Myers, Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Quebec. Bishop David Stancliffe, former Bishop of Salisbury, also joined us for several days. We were also delighted to welcome online contributions from the Revd Martin Browne, OSB, of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, Rome, from Bishop Anthony Ball, Director of the Anglican Centre, Rome, and by Archbishop Flavio Pace, Secretary of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity. All of these guests made presentations to the group on various matters, including the current state of relations between the Anglican Communion and the Roman Catholic Church. As is our practice, members and companions of the group also presented papers on topics of interest, though this year these were predominantly related to the work we are now doing on a document on sacramentality, orders and the Church, as a follow-up to our earlier paper on Anglican orders, Sorores in Spe, drawing in particular on the theme of the ecclesiology of symbol.
Our meeting coincided with the first visit to Rome of Archbishop Sarah Mullaly, and we were very conscious throughout our meeting of the historic significance of her meeting with Pope Leo. Despite many continuing disagreements between our churches, the evident warmth of the welcome she was given in Rome seemed to us an auspicious sign of our mutual determination to persevere in our walking together on the path towards full visible unity.
A future meeting is planned for next Spring, at a venue to be determined.
Anglican members
The Revd Dr Kirsty Borthwick, Christ Church, Oxford
The Revd Canon Prof Sarah Coakley, Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity Emerita, University of Cambridge – absent –
The Revd Canon Dr Jennifer Cooper, Canon Theologian of Newcastle Cathedral
The Revd Canon Dr James Hawkey, Canon Theologian of Westminster Abbey, London
The Rt Revd David Hamid, Former Suffragan Bishop of the Church of England Diocese in Europe; Former Co-chairman of IARCCUM
The Revd Canon Dr Jeremy Morris, Former National Adviser for Ecumenical Relations for the Church of England, and Affiliated Lecturer at the Faculty of Divinity, Cambridge University
The Most Revd David Moxon, Former Co-Chairman of ARCIC III and former representative of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Holy See and director of the ACR Rome – absent –
The Revd Canon Dr Nicholas Sagovsky, Former Canon Theologian of Westminster Abbey; member of ARCIC I & II – present online –
Catholic members
Prof Dr Joris Geldhof, Chair of the Liturgical Institute, Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven – present online –
Dr Maryana Hnyp, European Network on Religion and Belief, President – absent –
Prof Dr Arnaud Join-Lambert, Centre de théologie pratique, UC Louvain – absent –
Ms Vera La Mela, Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, Sweden
The Revd Prof Thomas O’Loughlin, Professor Emeritus of Historical Theology, University of Nottingham – absent –
The Revd Prof Dr Keith Pecklers, SJ, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome
The Revd Prof Dr Thomas Pott OSB, Pontifical Atheneum Sant’Anselmo, Rome
The Revd Dr. Gemma Simmonds CJ, Margaret Beaufort Institute of Theology, Cambridge – present online
The Revd Cyrille Vael OSB, Monastic Association for Encounter and Dialogue, Belgium – absent
Old-Catholic member
The Revd Prof Dr Angela Berlis, Institut für Christkatholische Theologie, Theologische Fakultät, Universität Bern, member of the Faith and Order Commission
Observers
The Rt Revd Anthony Ball, Representative of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Holy See and director of the Anglican Centre in Rome – present online –
The Revd Martin Browne OSB, Secretary to the Anglican and Methodist dialogues, DCPCU, Rome – present online –
Dr. Andrej Jeftic, Director of the Faith and Order Commission, World Council of Churches, Geneva
Guest speakers and guests
Brother Guide Dotti, Community of Bose
The Rt Revd Bruce Myers, Anglican Bishop of Quebec
Prof. Dr. David Roef Nieuwejaers, University of Maastricht
The Most Revd Flavio Pace, Secretary of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, Rome
Companions
His Eminence Joseph Cardinal Tobin, C.Ss.R, Archbishop of Newark
The Rt Hon The Earl of Halifax
The Rt Revd Dr David Stancliffe, Former Bishop of Salisbury
The Revd Em Prof Dr Gordon Lathrop, Professor Emeritus of Liturgy, Lutheran Theological Seminary, Philadelphia
The Most Revd Donald Bolen, Archbishop of Regina (Canada); Co-chairman of IARCCUM
The Very Revd Canon David Richardson, Former representative of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Holy See and director of the ACR
Patrons
His Eminence Jozef Cardinal De Kesel, Emeritus Archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels
The Rt Revd and Rt Hon The Lord Williams of Oystermouth, Former Archbishop of Canterbury
