Church of England accepts challenge to wage 'holy war' of cricket with Vatican

The Church of England has reportedly formally taken up the challenge by the Vatican to settle their scores in a 'holy war' of cricket nearly 500 years after the two Churches split.

Last year, the Vatican formed the St Peter's Cricket Club, a league composed of teams of priests and seminarians from Catholic colleges and seminaries in Rome.

According to Stuff.co.nz, the best players will form a Vatican team, called the 'Vatican XI', and challenge the Church of England to form its own team of Anglican priests and seminarians to play in London at the Lord's, the home of cricket.

The report mentioned that the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, head of the 80 million strong worldwide Anglican communion, accepted the challenge through his representative to the Vatican, Archbishop David Moxon.

Moxon said that the a combination of sports diplomacy and inter-religious dialogue would introduce a conversation piece all over the world whenever Catholics and Anglicans get together and may help improve relations between the two Churches, which split in 1534 when King Henry VIII broke with Rome.

The Vatican team, coached by an Indian priest Brother KK Joseph, will be made up of seminarians and priests in Rome from countries like India, Pakistan, Australia, England, Bangladesh and New Zealand and will wear the official colours of the state - yellow and white, with their jackets having the papacy seal, the report added.