February 14, 2026. A 60-year-old scholar kneels before the altar of St. Michael's Benedictine Abbey in Farnborough, England. The abbot, Dom Cuthbert Brogan, traces the sign of the cross on his forehead with sacred chrism. Nine words: "Signo te signo crucis, et confirmo te chrismate salutis."
Canon Robin Ward, for 19 years the principal of St. Stephen's House in Oxford—one of the Church of England's most influential theological colleges—has just been received into the Catholic Church.
But this is not a sudden decision. It is the end of a journey that began 40 years ago in the same city of Oxford, where he has spent most of his adult life. And his words afterward are striking: "I rejoice without regret or hesitation to find myself in this place."
What took four decades? And why now?
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