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'An ordinary means commanded by God': the Articles of Perth, the Jacobean Church of Scotland, and private Baptism

The ministers shall often admonish the people, that they defer not the baptizing of infants any longer than the next Lord's day after the child be born, unless upon a great and reasonable cause, declared to the minister, and by him approved, the same be postponed. As also, they shall warn them, that without great cause, they procure not their children to be baptized at home in their houses. But when great need shall compel them to baptize in private houses - in which case the minister shall not refuse to do it, upon the knowledge of the great need, and being timely required thereto - the baptism shall be ministered after the same form, as it should have been in the congregation - and the minister shall the next Lord's day after any such private baptism, declare in the church, that the infant was baptized, and therefore ought to be received as one of the true flock of Christ's fold. Amidst the provisions of the Articles of Perth was that, when necessity required it, minist...

'The end of our ministry is to promote the glory of God': an 1826 episcopal charge and Tract Number 1

Now then let me come at once to the subject which leads me to address you. Should the Government and Country so far forget their GOD as to cast off the Church, to deprive it of its temporal honours and substance, on what will you rest the claim of respect and attention which you make upon your flocks? Hitherto you have been upheld by your birth, your education, your wealth, your connexions; should these secular advantages cease, on what must CHRIST'S Ministers depend? With these words, published on 9th September 1833, did Tracts for the Times begin. In the first of the Tracts , John Henry Newman painted a picture of a Church of England corrupted by the Georgian era. Its clergy were dependent, we are told, on "birth ... education ... wealth ... connexions". He issued a trumpet call to the parsons of the Georgian Church, "to draw you forth from those pleasant retreats" and that "idle habit" of relying upon "that secular respectability, or cultivat...

'He had received the united thanks of a neighbouring nation's bishops': Nelson's 'Life of Bull' and the hopes for union with the Gallican Church

But however difficult the Employment might prove to Dr. Bull, in the decline of his Strength and Vigour, it certainly concerned the Honour of the Nation, not to suffer a Person to die in an obscure Retirement, who upon the account of his Learned Performances, had shined with so much Lustre in a neighbouring Nation, where he had received the united Thanks of her Bishops, for the great Service he had done to the Cause of Christianity. Accordingly he was consecrated Bishop of St. David's, in Lambeth Chapel on the 29th of April, 1705 ... And so it was that on the Third Sunday after Easter in 1705 that George Bull was consecrated to the episcopate. Robert Nelson, in his 1713 Life of Dr. George Bull , notes that, despite Bull's advanced age, such elevation to the episcopate was only fitting for a divine who had received the praise of the bishops of the Kingdom of France. This passing reference to the bishops of "a neighbouring Nation" exemplifies why the early 18th century...

New Georgians: a sensibility, a temperament, a disposition

Something of a tradition has emerged on Laudable Practice of marking the early May Bank Holiday with a reflection related to Georgian church interiors. While this holiday has other connotations, I enjoy it as quiet celebration of Spring, before the louder, garish days of Summer arrive. There is something about late Spring - its gentle light, the modest warmth after Winter, the fresh greenery of these days - which, I think, is reflected in the interior of Georgian churches. This May Day, I am prompted to address the 'New Georgians' - yes, in the words of the well-known meme, 'There are dozens of us. Dozens!'. I have previously suggested that those of us who might be called New Georgians seek "to promote an appreciation of 18th century Anglicanism, Georgian churches, and the ordinary, stolid piety that characterised the Georgian Church of England". Actually, it might be that there are a few more than 'dozens of us'. Something I enjoy posting on 'X...

A lost Anglicanism?

The King's state visit to the United States, marking the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, had me searching online for photographs of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II attending Episcopal services during their respective state visits. During his state visit, George VI, with FDR, attended divine service at St. James Episcopal Church, Hyde Park, New York City on Sunday 11th June 1939. The first photograph, taken after the service, shows the King and Queen, President and Mrs. Roosevelt, Bishop Henry St. George Tucker (then PECUSA Presiding Bishop), and two Episcopal clergy. The second and third photographs are of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip attending divine service in Old North Church on Sunday 11th July 1976, as part of the bicentennial celebrations. The photographs evoke something that, in many ways, been lost. Reflecting on the photographs, however, is neither a counsel of despair nor a call for reactionary outrage. It is, instead, an i...

'Our neighbour Church': the Articles of Perth, the Jacobean Church of Scotland, and the Church of England

As for the reformed churches, except our neighbor Church, they haue abandoned daies dedicated to Saints. For those who passionately opposed the Articles of Perth , the Church of England loomed large. The Articles were, it was asserted, a means of conforming the Church of Scotland to the 'but half-reformed' national Church south of the border. This explains why, although the Articles of Perth restored to the Church of Scotland the observance of the five principal festivals of our Lord but not the saints' days commemorated by the Church of England, the Articles' opponents raised the spectre of 'popish' saints' days. In the defence of the Articles of Perth given by David Lindsay, Bishop of Brechin (1619-34 and Bishop of Edinburgh 1634-38) - in his 1621 account of the 1618 General Assembly of the Church of Scotland held at Perth - the attack on the Church of England's saints' days is directly address, Firstly, Lindsay challenges the allegation on Hooker...