About Sacred Heart

Sacred Heart ANCC is an independent Catholic faith community in that we are not under the jurisdiction of the Pope nor are we subject to the canon law or the guidelines of the Roman Catholic Church. Though we share a common Catholic theology and liturgical tradition, we differ significantly in many of the disciplines and rules that govern the Church.

We recognize that each baptized person is an equal member of the Catholic Church.  No bishop, priest, deacon, or lay person owns the Church, the sacramental ministry, or the grace of Christ.  Therefore, all people play an important and prominent role in the governance of the Church.  All must respect, as well as actively seek to discern, how the Holy Spirit is motivating the faithful to act.  In Catholic tradition this is called ascertaining the sense of the faithful.

In our communities all the baptized, men and women alike, are given the opportunity to respond to a genuine vocation and to fully participate in the ministerial priesthood.  As St. Paul writes, There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female; all are one in Christ Jesus.  We recognize and are acting to correct the injustice done by the long-standing practice of excluding women from ordained ministry, which unfairly diminishes women within the Church and also within the current world culture.  Presently, within many of the communities of our Communion, women are actively engaged in the ordained priestly ministry and we have already enjoyed benefits of the coequal ministry of women in our faith communities.

Similarly, we affirm those, whether lay or ordained ministers, who are called to serve the People of God in a variety of life states which include people who are single, or have taken promises of celibacy, commitment, or marriage, and all affirm the full and open participation in all the sacraments of LGBT persons.   We believe that the gift of sexual union is a source and celebration of love for couples, which allows for the special and safe sharing of intimacy.  We consider it a danger to marriage and other intimate relationships to be denied sexual sharing.  This has significant implications for Catholic practice, particularly as it applies to divorce and remarriage.

We affirm the dignity of all human persons regardless of race, national origin, religious affiliation, gender, or sexual orientation. We strive for justice within the universal Church and the whole world.