MARCH 18, 2017

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT (ANGLICAN)–381

How a supporter of women’s ordination left the Anglican church to become a Catholic

By Francis Phillips, February 19, 2015

The author of Bread Not Stones had a dramatic and unconventional journey to Rome.

It is always interesting to read the various ways that convertsstumble onto the path to Rome. Surely one of the strangest accounts in modern times is that of Dr. Una Kroll, whose autobiography, Bread Not Stones, has recently been published by Christian Alternative. Dr. Kroll received quite a lot of publicity in the past as an active and vocal Christian feminist. Indeed, she was ordained into the Anglican priesthood as one of the first women priests of the Church of Wales.

The title of her book is taken from an incident at the Church of England’s General Synod of 1978. When its members at that time turneddown a proposal to prepare women for ordination, Una Kroll shouted from the gallery: “We asked you for bread and you gave us a stone!”

This might sound an unpromising start to conversion to the CatholicChurch, which only permits an all-male priesthood. But Kroll’s whole life has been one of dramatic change, loss, upheaval and spiritual breakdown, in the midst of a long, painful quest for spiritual truth.

Born in 1924, her father deserted the family when she was very young.

Raised by her mother alone, she endured much poverty before winning a scholarship to study medicine at Cambridge in 1944. Qualifying in 1951 and thinking of a specialist career in neurosurgery, she made the impulsive decision in 1953 to become an Anglican medical/missionary nun. Sent to work in Liberia she found combining medicine and religious life very hard and fell ill. Escorted back to the UK by Leopold Kroll, the monk who was head of her religious order, they fell in love and had to leave their respective communities. They married in 1957.

Thirty years of happy marriage and raising four children was combined with working as a GP and training as a deaconess. After her husband’s death in 1987, Kroll returned to being a nun and chose to live as a“solitary” in life vows. In 1997, aged 71, she was ordained in the Church of Wales, returning to England in 2003. For five years, living in Bury, near her son, she continued as an Anglican solitary, but began to experience difficulties with the Church of England’s then discriminatory practices against women in the ministry.

Then came the seemingly inexplicable twist to the story. In 2008, deeply unhappy in the Church of England and struggling with doubts about her faith, she made a short retreat in a Cistercian monastery. Spending time alone in the “large austere church”, she writes that “one day I encountered a vibrant Energy there that overwhelmed me.” She came to describe it as “Unconditional Creative Love.” Impelled by this love which “had no logic”, Kroll found herself seeking it “within that most autocratic of institutions: the Catholic Church.” Her Anglican feminist friends called it “a perverse decision” and Kroll herself admitted that she had always declared “I would never join the Catholic Church because of its hierarchical structures, its system of governance that excluded most laity from decision-making and its attitude towards women and homosexuals.”

Six years later she recognises “how essential [conversion] was for me.” She explains it thus: “It was not until I came to be enclosed” in the Catholic Church – making it impossible for me to carry out the public ministry of a woman priest in the Church of England – that I understood that confinement within this anchorage not of my making could ultimately lead to freedom.” Indeed, she discovered that she could point towards the mystery of unconditional love “without insisting that my views were right and everyone else’s wrong.”

Today Kroll describes herself as “a prisoner of hope…who trusts what they do not know to be there – but who also acts on that belief.” And the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist “helps me to recognise that same Presence echoed in creation.” Her autobiography is a courageous and humble story – and also testimony to the mysterious workings of grace in the individual soul. One thing lacking in the book is any reference to the works of saints that might have helped her overcome her prejudices against the Church – such as Newman’s writings (and his support of the lay vocation) or the mysticalwritings of St Teresa of Avila. And perhaps, if she had come to know Our Lady at an earlier stage in her spiritual quest, it might have put Kroll’s desire for female ordination in a different light.

SOME RELATED FILES

TESTIMONY-PROTESTANT PASTORS ON THE ROAD TO ROME

ARCHBISHOP OF DELHI SUPPORTS WOMEN'S ORDINATION

CHURCH CITIZENS VOICE OF DR JAMES KOTTOOR IS LIBERAL AND NEW AGE

COMPANION INDIA-WHY I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND THIS MAGAZINE TO CATHOLICS

EXCOMMUNICATED WOMAN PRIEST MINISTERS IN BENEDICTINE MONASTERY

FEMINIST NUN CRITICIZES THE CHURCH ON NATIONAL TELEVISION

NEW COMMUNITY BIBLE 15-DEMAND FOR ORDINATION OF WOMEN PRIESTS-FR SUBHASH ANAND AND OTHERS

POPE FRANCIS SAYS NO TO WOMEN PRIESTS

QUO VADIS PAPA FRANCISCO 01-WASHING THE FEET OF WOMEN ON MAUNDY THURSDAY

QUO VADIS PAPA FRANCISCO 01A-WASHING THE FEET OF WOMEN ON MAUNDY THURSDAY

QUO VADIS PAPA FRANCISCO 01B-FRANCIS LEGITIMIZES WASHING THE FEET OF WOMEN AFTER VIOLATING RUBRICS

QUO VADIS PAPA FRANCISCO 08-CONSULTOR TO THE PONTIFICAL COUNCIL FOR CULTURE PRACTISES NEW AGE ADVOCATES THE HERESY OF WOMEN PRIESTS

RADICAL FEMINISM AND THE ORDINATION OF WOMEN

UCAN WANTS TO DO AWAY WITH THE PRIESTHOOD

UCAN CONFIRMS IT FAVOURS WOMEN PRIESTS

UCAN CONFIRMS IT FAVOURS WOMEN PRIESTS-02

UCAN CONFIRMS IT FAVOURS WOMEN PRIESTS-03

VIRGINIA SALDANHA-ECCLESIA OF WOMEN IN ASIA AND CATHERINE OF SIENA VIRTUAL COLLEGE-FEMINIST THEOLOGY AND THE ORDINATION OF WOMEN PRIESTS

VIRGINIA SALDANHA-WOMENPRIESTS INFILTRATES THE INDIAN CHURCH-CATHERINE OF SIENA VIRTUAL COLLEGE

WASHING THE FEET OF WOMEN ON HOLY THURSDAY

WOMEN PRIESTS-THE NCR-UCAN-EWA NEXUS

WHAT'S VIRGINIA SALDANHA DOING WITH "NUNS ON THE BUS"?

These Protestant women pastors/nuns became Catholic nuns

[ORANGE COLOUR] indicates that the individual was a pastor/religious.ORANGE COLOUR without brackets indicates that the individual became a Catholic priest/nun:

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-56ROSALIND MOSS/MOTHER MIRIAM [EVANGELICAL/JEW]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-199 ALL SAINTS SISTERS OF THE POOR [EPISCOPALIAN NUNS]

These Protestant women pastors/nuns converted to Catholicism

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-97PATRICIA IRELAND [LUTHERAN PASTOR]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-98JENNIFER MEHL FERRARA [LUTHERAN PASTOR] FORMER PRO-WOMEN’S ORDINATION

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-104LINDA POINDEXTER [EPISCOPALIAN PASTOR]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-381DR. UNA KROLL [ANGLICAN]

This Protestant woman became a Catholic nun and the first native-born citizen of the United States to be canonized a saint:

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-283ST. ELIZABETH ANN SETON, SISTERS OF CHARITY [EPISCOPALIAN]

TESTIMONY-PROTESTANT PASTORS ON THE ROAD TO ROME

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-03G K CHESTERTON [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-04JOHN HENRY NEWMAN [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-08EDWIN BARNES [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-16DWIGHT LONGENECKER[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-40DAVID DAINTREE [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-43FREDERICK C. COPLESTON [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-45FRANCIS JAMIESON[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-77MALCOLM MUGGERIDGE[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-85CHORI SERAIAH [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-90AIMEE MILBURN COOPER [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-92JONATHAN BENNETT [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-93DAVID BENNETT [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-106ANN WIDDECOMBE [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-107RICHARD RUTT [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-108CHRISTOPHER COLVIN [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-109JOHN JAY HUGHES [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-110CONRAD MEYER [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-111RAY BECK [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-112GRAHAM LEONARD [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-119ROBERT MERCER[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-120PETER HUGHES[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-121JONATHAN REDVERS-HARRIS[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-122DAVID ELLIOTT[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-123ANDREW BURNHAM, KEITH NEWTON, JOHN BROADHURST[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-124KEITH NEWTON[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-125ANN VAUGHAN[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-126IVAN AQUILINA & JAMES BRADLEY[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-130IAN HELLYER[ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-147 DOUGLAS B. FARROW[ANGLICAN] (PRO-LIFE)

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-156 OSCAR WILDE [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-175 PAUL RICHARDSON [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-177 JOHN HIND [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-180 JEFFREY STEEL [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-196 EDITH TOLKIEN [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-225 DOLORES STEENHUIS [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-258 WALTER BRIETZKE [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-323DAVID WARREN [ANGLICAN]

TESTIMONY OF A FORMER PROTESTANT-366 PAUL SCHENCK [ANGLICAN] (PRO-LIFE)

+Over 1300 testimoniesof Jesus experiences and conversion to Catholicism including hundreds of pro-life testimonies at .