'To our own amazement and the admiration of angels': Bishop Bull on the saving nature of the Incarnation

On this Christmas Eve, we turn to Bishop Bull's sermon 'The blessed Virgin's low and exalted Condition' on the text Luke 1:48-49 - "For He hath regarded the low estate of His handmaiden; for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For He that is mighty hath done for me great things; and holy is His name". Bull declares "that both it [i.e. the text] and the whole Magnificat, or song of the blessed Virgin, is applicable to, and may be made use of by, all true Christians".

There is something of an echo here of Bede's statement that the use of the Magnificat at Evening Prayer is a "meditating upon the incarnation". Even more significantly, Bull is also following Augustine:

it means more for Mary to have been a disciple of Christ than to have been the mother of Christ. It means more for her, an altogether greater blessing, to have been Christ's disciple than to have been Christ's mother.

There is, then, solid patristic precedent in interpreting the Magnificat as the Blessed Virgin proclaiming not blessings unique to her, but as reflecting the grace in which we all share by virtue of the Incarnation of the Word. To say or sing the Magnificat at Evening Prayer, therefore, is to give voice to "our own amazement and the admiration of the angels" that God has wrought "our common salvation" in the Incarnate Word:

The nature which the Son of God assumed of his virgin mother is our common nature, which is by that assumption transcendently, to our own amazement and the admiration of angels, dignified and advanced. The eternal Word, by his incarnation, or being made flesh, intended not directly to honour the blessed Virgin in particular, but mankind in general. He intended thereby to declare us his brethren, by being made of the same flesh and blood that we are, as the divine author of the Epistle to the Hebrews assures us, chap. ii.14. Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same. And verse 17. Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren. In a word, the Son of God therefore honoured the blessed Virgin so far, as in and from her to become man, that he might advance human nature, by assuming it into the unity of his divine person; and that being born of her, he might procure, not only hers, but our common salvation. So that every one of us may sing the Magnificat, and bear a part in this divine anthem, and, mutatis mutandis, say, "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. For he hath regarded the low estate of us vile and mortal men, his poor servants and vassals. For behold from henceforth, and upon the account of the incarnation of the Son of God, the whole creation, yea the very angels themselves, shall and do proclaim us blessed. For he that is mighty hath magnified us in the highest degree, by uniting himself to our nature, and therefore holy is, and for ever blessed be, his name."

(The photograph is of St. Davids Cathedral, Pembrokeshire. Bull was Bishop of St. Davids 1705-10.)

Why I support the ordination of women: a High Church reflection

A number of commenters on this blog have asked about my occasional expressions of support for the ordination of women to all three orders. With some hesitation, I have decided to post a summary of my own views on this matter. The hesitation is because I have sought on this blog to focus on issues and themes which can unify those who identify with or have respect (grudging or otherwise!) for what we might term 'classical' Anglicanism (the Anglicanism of the Formularies and - yes - of the Old High Church tradition). Some oppose the ordination of women (and I have friends and colleagues who do so, Anglo-Catholic, High Church, and Reformed Evangelical). Some of us support it (again, friends and colleagues covering a wide range of theological traditions). Below, I have organised my thinking around 5 points (needless to say, no reference to Dort is implied). 1. The Declaration for Subscription required of clergy in the Church of Ireland states: (6) I promise to submit ...

How the Old High tradition continued

Charles Gore's 1914 letter to the clergy of his diocese, ' The Basis of Anglican Fellowship ', can be regarded as a classical expression of the Prayer Book Catholic tradition. A key part of the letter - entitled 'Romanizing in the Church of England' - addressed the "Catholic movement", questioning beliefs and practices within it which tended to "a position which makes it very difficult for its extremer representatives to give an intelligible reason why they are not Roman Catholics". Gore provides the outlines of an alternative account and experience of catholicity within Anglicanism, defined by three characteristics. What is particularly interesting about these characteristics is their continuity with the older High Church tradition. Indeed, the central characteristic as set out by Gore was integral to High Church claims over centuries: To accept the Anglican position as valid, in any sense, is to appeal behind the Pope and the authority of t...

1928 practices and the 1979 book: unthinking conservatism or popular piety?

Those responsible for Earth & Altar - a new blog emanating from a group within TEC - are to be congratulated for an excellent contribution to wider Anglican discussion and debate. The commitment to "an expansively conceived credal orthodoxy as fully compatible with LGBTQ inclusion, gender equality, and racial justice" is an important part of a wider retrieval of creedal orthodoxy within what we might call the post-liberal generation. It is in this spirit that I want to respond to a recent post on the site by Andrew McGowan , Dean of the Berkeley Divinity School at Yale and Professor of Anglican Studies at Yale Divinity School. Against the background of another round of "ill-defined" liturgical revision in TEC, he understandably urges that a fuller reception of the 1979 BCP should occur before further reforms. In doing so, however, he takes aim at what he describes as "clinging to the ritual structures of 1928" while using the text of 1979. We ...

laudable Practice

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