[2] He received his episcopal consecration on the following 1 May from Cardinal Herbert Vaughan, with Bishops John Baptist Butt and Thomas Whiteside, in St. George's Cathedral.

In defiance of the governmental law banning Eucharistic processions, Bourne gave the benediction from the loggia of Westminster Cathedral in 1908.

The leading lay English Catholic intellectual at the time, Baron Friedrich von Hügel, was on the moderate wing of the Modernist movement.

Knowing of von Hügel's holiness and fundamental loyalty,[6] Bourne told the Baron's daughter Thekla, "I have never got him into trouble and I never will.

"[7] Michael de la Bédoyère describes Bourne as "a prelate whose wisdom and statesmanship have never been sufficiently acknowledged".

[6] He was not overly supportive of interfaith dialogue[8] nor of ecumenism (he notably opposed the holding of the Malines Conversations between prominent Anglicans and Catholics).