Reflecting on the Platinum Jubilee celebrations: A New Elizabethan Anglicanism?

With the festivities of the Platinum Jubilee now past, it might be an appropriate time for Anglicans in this realm and the dominions to reflect on what we might learn from the celebrations. For Anglicans elsewhere, ministering in the context of different constitutional arrangements, there might also be some value to this: not, obviously, as a commendation of monarchy but, rather, in terms of considering how contemporary Anglicanism might renew its historic understanding of constitutional order as gift to be received with solemn thanksgiving.  

Three aspects of Anglican celebration of the Platinum Jubilee are particularly worth reflecting upon, not least in how they are suggestive of a wider vision of theological renewal for Anglicanism.

Firstly, the anthem written by composer Judith Weir for the National Service of Thanksgiving to Celebrate her Majesty's Platinum Jubilee - 'By Wisdom' - should receive theological attention.  Weir has said of her composition:

Amongst many ancient writings which examine the importance of Wisdom in our life on earth is the Old Testament Book of Proverbs. The short selection of verses (from Proverbs, Chapter 3) set to music in this anthem celebrate ‘the one who finds wisdom, the one who gains understanding’.

This use of Proverbs 3 echoes a profoundly Hookerian emphasis.  As Torrance Kirby has said of Hooker:

Hooker’s appeal to the principles of sapiential theology with their defining emphasis on the yoking together of wisdom, both natural and revealed, constitutes the mainstay of his apologetic throughout his great treatise … the grand cosmic scheme of laws set out in Book I is intended to place the particulars of the controversy within the foundational context of a sapiential theology.

Dominak's superb exploration of Hooker's "architecture of participation" reveals how his defence of the good order of the Elizabethan Church and commonwealth was a participation "in the providential wisdom of God", the "amiable order of ... Sophia", for "nature and grace share the amiable character of Wisdom".  Weir's anthem for the Platinum Jubilee of the second Elizabeth rejoices in this "amiable order" expressed in the role of the monarch in the commonwealth and manifested in the reign of this Elizabeth.  More than this, it exemplifies that Hookerian tradition of joyful reverence towards and gratitude for a good and wise order in Church and commonwealth, a tradition that should be much more evident in contemporary Anglican life and witness.

Secondly, theologian John Milbank's comment on the Jubilee celebrations rightly drew attention to an obvious lesson for contemporary Anglicanism in the United Kingdom and the dominions:

Given the huge popularity of the Crown, why doesn’t the Anglican Church put forward a more serious theology of monarchy?

— john milbank (@johnmilbank3) June 5, 2022

Such a more serious theology of monarchy needs sources within contemporary Anglicanism if it is to flourish and be sustained.  What might such sources be?  The use of the Book of Common Prayer would be a vital part of this, with its regular prayers for the monarch contrasting with the absence of such prayers from contemporary liturgies.  (We might note that the National Service of Thanksgiving, while in structure and idiom a contemporary liturgy, reverted to the Prayer Book inasmuch as it sought to echo 1662's serious prayer for the monarch, missing from Common Worship.) Taking Article 37 seriously would also be important. This Article outlines a substantive theology of the civil magistrate in general, and of the Crown in particular, which refutes the Anabaptist political theology of Hauerwas, evident in far too much contemporary Anglican political theology.  Meaningful observance of Accession Day (with the propers provided in the Book of Common Prayer) would also provide a liturgical focus for a renewed serious theology of monarchy, both reconnecting with historic Anglican practice of gathering up civic life in the Church's prayer and thanksgiving, and providing an occasion for teaching on the matter.

Thirdly, the fact that Whitsun fell on the Jubilee weekend did not - despite the urging on social media of clerical anti-monarchists - result in Anglican churches retreating to Hauerwas' sectarian enclave, considering Pentecost to be incompatible with celebration of the Jubilee.  Instead, some Anglican parishes enjoyed excellent preaching which weaved together Whitsun and the Jubilee, the vocation of the Monarch and the vocation of the baptised and confirmed. To give two examples of such excellent sermons, consider that preached in St. John's, Devizes in the Diocese of Salisbury and that preached in Little St. Mary's, Cambridge.  From the former:

Let us see instead if we can discern in the life of the Queen the Holy Spirit at work in the life a faithful lay Christian woman, empowered in that Holy Spirit at her Confirmation while still a girl eighty or so years ago. For if we do that, far from doing something elitist, we are undermining the idea that holiness is the preserve of priests and prelates.

From the latter:

What you see being acted out at the heart of nation and Commonwealth is something that is equally relevant to each of us as we grow into our Christian identities.  As at the Coronation, so with us the Holy Spirit comes as Advocate and Helper.

As both extracts suggest, these sermons show how the monarchy and the reign of Elizabeth II can lead Church and commonwealth to a deeper understanding of the vocation of both, of what it means for both to share and participate in God's goodness, truth, and beauty.  A similar theme was also seen in the Archbishop of Armagh's 2022 Accession Day sermon:

Her Majesty the Queen has understood what many people (including many religious people) have failed to grasp; that all life is God’s, and that it is the manner in which we do the ordinary things of life which is a true discipleship ...

It is particularly important that the Queen’s accession is celebrated here tonight in a religious service.  Not just because the Queen herself has never made any secret of the depth of his Christian belief (just as she has never made a show of it) – but because, in terms of the British Constitution – the monarchy is first and foremost a religious office.

Reflecting on the celebration of the Platinum Jubilee should bring us to recognise significant sources of renewal available to the Anglican tradition.  Judith Weir's Platinum Jubilee anthem points to the rich theology of human flourishing in Anglicanism's Hookerian sapiential theology.  In Prayer Book and Articles, there are liturgical and doctrinal sources which can connect with popular, joyous support for the monarchy, drawing it into the Church's life of prayer and faith.  (Under other constitutional arrangements, this points to how a generous patriotism and gratitude for civic order can similarly be caught up in prayer and thanksgiving.)  And the historic Anglican tradition of serious, meaningful preaching on such civic and state occasions is certainly, in places, very much alive.  

All this is suggestive of the wider theological project described by John Hughes as "Anglicanism as integral humanism": a piety, sensibility, theology, and "ecclesio-political" vision which rejects both sectarianism and "empty inclusion", in which "nature is always already oriented towards supernatural grace and where grace does not destroy nature but fulfils and perfects it".  Perhaps we can suggest an alternative term to describe such a renewal of contemporary Anglicanism: this would be a New Elizabethan Anglicanism.  

Richard Hooker concluded the Dedication to Book V of the Laws by declaring, "By the goodnes of almightie God and his servant Elizabeth we are".  These are words that a New Elizabethan Anglicanism might also invoke.