laudable Practice

The restoring a king to his just rights, and a people to their religion, liberty, and estates, and all orders and  degrees of men to their ancient powers and privileges: such a restoration is a blessed thing indeed; it is like restoring life to three kingdoms.  Daniel Waterland's sermon on 29th May 1723 - 'Being the Anniversary Day of Thanksgiving for the Restoration' - exemplifies the purpose of the liturgical commemoration of Oak Apple Day.  It is a day to give thanks for the gift of constitutional order, for the right ordering of the polity.  In a disordered polity, the ability to live out the apostolic exhortation is hindered and undermined: "that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty".  In a disordered polity, the divine purpose revealed in the prophet's vision is rejected: "But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid: for the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken...

Reformed Protestants (on all sides of the vestiarian controversy) rejected and wished to guard against sacerdotalism and idolatry, not beauty, dignity, and order. They disagreed over how the principle applied in the case of the surplice and whether or not the monarch could make that decision for the church. The controversy over vesture (and ornaments more broadly) was never about aesthetics. The conclusion to Drew Keane's recent otherwise excellent examination, on The North American Anglican , of the Ornaments Rubric seems to rather overstate matters.  For example, the suggestion that Conformists, supporting the use of the surplice, were not concerned with "beauty, dignity, and order" is at least partly contradicted by the words of Bullinger - in a letter to clergy critical of the surplice - quoted in the article: The leader of the church in Zurich replied: "[I]t is not yet proved that the pope introduced a distinction of habits into the church; so far from it, that ...

From Thomas Secker's Sermon CX - ' The only Satisfying Evidence that a Portion of theSpirit of God is Imparted to Men, is the UniformDisplay of Practical Piety and Virtue ' - on Galatians 5:22-23, the fruit of the Spirit.  In referring to the "inward motions of the Holy Spirit", Secker stresses "we have seldom, if at all, an immediate and distinct perception of these influences".  This was a common defence of Anglican experience and pastoral practice, later repeated, for example, by Mant .  It can be seen as having a continued relevance in Anglican thinking, challenging some of the emphasises within 'Weird Christian' discourse and the assumptions that often underpin advocacy within contemporary Anglicanism of congregationalist or sectarian models in opposition to parish and national church: Nor is it any real [objection] from experience, that we have seldom, if at all, an immediate and distinct perception of these influences. For our fellow-creat...

In a previous post , I suggested that Old High Churchman William Jacobson's 1840 sermon on the day of thanksgiving for the deliverance of Queen Victoria from an assassination attempt was evidence of a reassertion of High Church political theology in the changed context following the 'constitutional revolution' of 1828-32.  Another example of this can be found in Jacobson's 1847 sermon for 20th June , the Prayer Book's Accession Day service. Jacobson's sermon begins with what may seem like a rupture.  He accepts the difficulties of "various minds" with the Prayer Book's other State Services, those for 30th January, 29th May, and 5th November: The Services of other State-Holidays may be one sided in their views, and inflated in their expression;  and though the narrowness of prejudice and the exaggeration of language may admit of much extenuation, if the circumstances under which they were originally drawn up are taken fairly into account, we m...

Thomas Secker  (consecrated bishop in 1737, Archbishop of Canterbury 1758-68), in his sermon ' Confirmation of Divine Authority; And its Importance in Promoting Piety and Virtue ', explains what it means to "take on ourselves the vow of our baptism". In doing so, he offers a critique that has relevance to the ' Weird Christian ' movement, pointing instead to the Christian life lived out in and through "substantial duties": I do sincerely believe, and will constantly profess, all the articles of the Christian faith. I do firmly resolve to keep all God's commandments all the days of my life: to love and honour him; to pray to Him and praise Him daily in private; to attend conscientiously on the public worship and instruction, which he hath appointed; to approach his holy table, as soon as I can qualify myself for doing it worthily ... I do resolve in the government of myself, to be modest, sober, temperate, mild, humble, contented; to restrain ...

On the first Sunday after Trinity 1840, William Jacobson ascended the pulpit in the parish church of Iffley , Oxford, where he was perpetual curate.  The day had been appointed as one of thanksgiving for the recent deliverance of Queen Victoria from an attempt on her life.  At the outset of the sermon , Jacobson gave voice to a well-established High Church emphasis: For, remember, however much the form of government may be permitted to vary in different countries, whatever be the alterations in the working and administration of government which may be thought (and thought at times with the best reason) necessary and desirable in the same country, as one generation comes into the place of another, the duty remains as binding as ever, 'Let every soul be subject to the higher powers'. The doctrine of Scripture does not vary with the changes and modifications which man's wisdom dictates: There is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever theref...

On this Ascension Day - Holy Thursday - an example of post-1833 High Church thought. William Jacobson stood in the Old High Church tradition, preferring "unobtrusive usefulness" to Tractarian rancour and divisiveness.  His scholarly edition of the Apostolic Fathers was criticised by Newman in 1839 as a "supercilious way of dealing with the writings of the Fathers".  Jacobson, widely recognised as one of the most eminent Anglican patristic scholars, read the Fathers in traditional Anglican fashion, seeing in them an affirmation of Reformed doctrine.  For Newman this was unacceptable because, of course, it was only the Tractarians who did not bring "antecedent reasoning" to the Fathers, only the Tractarians could discern "primitive Christianity", only the Tractarians could discern "the Catholic system" in the Fathers. In Jacobson's 1839 Ascension Day sermon , we see significant characteristics of Old High Church teaching.  The o...

Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain - James 5:7, from the Second Lesson at Evensong on Rogation Tuesday. I noticed yesterday on Twitter a reference to the priest-poet as "a tradition at the heart of Anglicanism".  This is, indeed, true and a cause for rejoicing.  Rogationtide, however, reminds us that there is also another tradition within the Anglican experience that should be celebrated: that of the parson-naturalist.  As Bishop Graham Usher in his new book The Way Under Our Feet: The Spirituality of Walking states, there is "a long line of naturalist priests within the Anglican tradition". From John Lightfoot's Flora Scotia to Gilbert White's  Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne , from Parson Woodforde's observations of his garden and the weather to Francis Kilvert'...

... inconsistent with all Restrictions of regal Power, & tends to universal Despotism ... Let a Reader of the History of England, ask himself, what he thinks would have been the Result, if the Dogmas of those High-Churchmen had prevailed - from William White's An   Essay on High Church Principles (1818). White's critique of High Church political theology reflects a well-established and still prevalent view that the High Church tradition was defined by an inflated view of monarchy, a fawning over the Crown's use of Prerogative power, intoxicated by the false glories of the claims of divine right. And yet White's Essay itself might lead us to question this portrayal of the "Extreme of the High-church System".  He points, for example, to a range of High Church figures who had set forth a vision of monarchy limited by law and parliament: Lancelot Andrewes, Thomas Sherlock, George Horne, and Thomas Secker. White's words came to mind when I was re...

Despite the separation the coronavirus has enforced upon us, then, it’s also prompted a refocusing on our need for one another and especially for those near to us geographically ... In the renewal of communal solidarity, in the return to the local, may the church find itself invigorated with a new parochialism to match. These words from David Bagnall's reflection in SCM's 'Theology in Isolation' series were not written with Rogationtide in mind, but they are particularly appropriate reading for Rogation Days.  Rogationtide embodies parochialism, what Clerk of Oxford has described as "the relationship between human bodies and the physical space they inhabit - to touch and mark its boundaries, to feel the earth beneath their feet". The Rogation Days, in other words, recall us to the significance of the local for our well-being and flourishing.  To attempt to 'free' ourselves from the local, to desire to be 'liberated' by the global, is to...

Richard Mant's 1812 Bampton Lectures, An Appeal to the Gospel: Or an Inquiry Into the Justice of the Charge, Alleged by the Methodists and Other Objectors, That the Gospel Is Not Preached by the National Clergy , were a critique of the theologies of Whitefield ("the Calvinistic Founder of Methodism") and Wesley ("the Arminian Founder of Methodism").  Mant particularly highlights the experiential emphasis of both streams of Methodism: there is no point on which Methodists of every denomination have been more prone to insist, than on their inward impulses and feelings; their experiences, in the phraseology of the sect ; as the direct witness of the Holy Spirit in their hearts. Against "our modern Enthusiasts in their narrations of ... violent and extraordinary inspirations", Mant points to the Sacraments as the ordinary means of grace: The condition of the Christian life is well described by one of our Reformers [Alexander Nowell] , in a work bea...

It would be easy to read extracts of George Henry Law's 1820 Charge to the clergy of the diocese of Chester as evidence of a somnolent, worldly, ineffective Church of England - the conventional caricature of Georgian Anglicanism.  When the Bishop begins his Charge by reminding the clergy of the importance of punctuality for the beginning of services, it suggests a rather limited sense of episcopal priorities: Complaints have in some cases been made to me, concerning a want of punctuality in the time of beginning the divine service of our church. Now, the hour should be such, as best suits the habits and the convenience of the great body of the parishioners. But, when once it is fixed, you should be most scrupulously exact in your observance of the same. Many of the clergy do not appear sufficiently aware of the great offence occasioned, by negligence in this respect.  The Bishop's strictures against "the pernicious tendency of many of those hymns, which have of la...

From William Vaux's 1826 Bampton Lectures,  The Benefits Annexed to a Participation in the Two Christian Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper .  Vaux was a High Churchman and a chaplain to Charles Manners-Sutton, Archbishop of Canterbury 1805-28, whose archepiscopate symbolised the ascendancy of the High Church tradition. In his sixth lecture, Vaux set forth a traditional High Church account of the Eucharist as a 'feast upon a sacrifice', drawing out the significance of this description against "the Hoadleian theory".  It illustrates the vitality and depth of High Church sacramental theology in the late Georgian Church and the decade before the Oxford Movement. It cannot therefore, as has been contended by Hoadley and his followers, be a sufficient account of the observance, to consider it as a simple memorial, or bare act of commemoration ... It is therefore of his body, as offered and sacrificed for us upon the cross, that he enjoins us to eat...

Jesus said unto his disciples, Now I go my way to him that sent me ... it is expedient for you that I go away. The opening words of the Gospel for this week - the fourth after Easter - in the traditional Prayer Book lectionary orient us towards the forthcoming feast of the Lord's Ascension.  This is also reflected in the collect: that so, among the sundry and manifold changes of the world, our hearts may surely there be fixed, where true joys are to be found. Similarly the Gospel appointed for Sunday coming - Rogation Sunday - also prepares us for Ascension Day.  As Wheatly says in his Prayer Book commentary, "it foretells our Saviour's Ascension": I leave the world, and go to the Father. These Sundays are, then, are an invitation to catechesis in preparation for the celebration of the Lord's Ascension.  The fixed Gospel readings ensure that year by year we are oriented towards and prepared for this feast.  In the three year lectionary, such catec...