September 30, 2022

Lee Ashton ordained a permanent deacon for Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter

Bishop Steven J. Lopes ritually lays hands on deacon candidate Lee Ashton on Aug. 10 at Our Lady of Walsingham Cathedral in Houston during a Mass in which Ashton was ordained permanent deacons for the Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter. (Submitted photo)

Bishop Steven J. Lopes ritually lays hands on deacon candidate Lee Ashton on Aug. 10 at Our Lady of Walsingham Cathedral in Houston during a Mass in which Ashton was ordained permanent deacons for the Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter. (Submitted photo)

Criterion staff report

Deacon Lee Ashton of Indianapolis was ordained a permanent deacon of the Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter on Aug. 10 at Our Lady of Walsingham Cathedral in Houston by Bishop Steven J. Lopes, the shepherd of the ordinariate.

Deacon Ashton now ministers at St. Cuthbert of Lindisfarne Parish, an ordinariate parish community that currently meets and worships at the archdiocese’s Good Shepherd Parish in Indianapolis.

A veteran of the U.S. Navy, Deacon Ashton serves as a volunteer chaplain in the No Veteran Dies Alone Program at the Roudebush Veterans’ Administration Medical Center in Indianapolis. He is also the chair for the Order of Malta in Indiana and serves on the board of directors for Catholic Radio Indy.

The ordinariate was established by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012 as a diocese-like structure in the Church for former Anglicans, Episcopalians and Methodists in the U.S. and Canada who have been received into the full communion of the Church. It features a form of the Mass that draws from the spiritual and liturgical heritage of the Church of England and the Sarum Mass.

Deacon Ashton was received into the full communion of the Church during an Easter Vigil Mass on April 7, 2012, at SS. Peter and Paul Cathedral in Indianapolis. †

Local site Links: