Parish to be run by French community

The Archdiocese of Westminster is to hand the running of a prominent parish in north London to a French Catholic community.

Christ the King, in Cockfosters, has been in the hands of the Olivetan Benedictine community for 77 years but due to declining numbers of monks, it was announced last year they would withdraw from administering the parish.

Last month, the Archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Nichols, wrote to parishioners announcing that Chemin Neuf, a Catholic community with an “ecumenical vocation” which has links with the Archbishop of Canterbury, would take responsibility for the parish. This is the first parish that the community has been given to run in Britain.

Chemin Neuf, founded in 1973 out of the charismatic renewal movement, also includes a focus on Ignatian spirituality. The national leader of the group in the UK, Alan Morley-Fletcher, is an Anglican. Fr Michel Le Piouff, a member of Chemin Neuf, will become the new parish priest and he will be accompanied by a religious sister, a married couple and a seminarian.

Christ the King is a large complex of buildings that includes a monastery that had housed the Benedictines. In his letter the archbishop said that Chemin Neuf plan to open a student hostel in the monastery, something they have done in other places. 

Dom Bernard Akoeso, the parish priest, said parishioners are upset as the change was a “shock to the system”. He stressed, however, that Archbishop Nichols had “done very well” to provide a priest for the parish.

Christ the King has a weekly Mass attendance of just under 700 and as a parish pioneered some of the liturgical changes in the years after the Second Vatican Council. 

Mr Morley-Fletcher said Chemin Neuf has successfully run parishes in France and will be “very sensitive to the needs of people already there in the parish”. Bishop John Arnold, an auxiliary in Westminster, said: “I have every confidence that he [Fr Le Piouff] will continue the excellent pastoral care of the parishioners while being supported by the Chemin Neuf community and the parish administrative team.” When he was Dean of Liverpool,  Archbishop Justin Welby oversaw the appointment of an Anglican deacon who had worked for Chemin Neuf.