laudable Practice

The Advent quality of the restoration of the Church of England in 1660 was captured by the sermon preached by William Sancroft on Advent Sunday of that year, at the consecration of seven bishops in Westminster Abbey for the newly restored Church: When the Lord turned again the Captivity of Sion, they made their thankful acknowledgements, and said in the Psalm, The Lord hath done great things for us already, whereof we will be glad. But then it follows immediately in the next Verse, Turn again our Captivity, O Lord, as the Rivers in the South. It seems, their Captivity (I am sure Ours) is still to turn again, even after 'tis returned. For there are relics of it still behind; and the sad Effects remain, (an Age will hardly be able to Efface them;) and, which is the saddest of All, we are still, I fear, in captivity to the same Sins, that occasioned that; and they are able to bring upon us Ten Thousand Captivities, worse, than the former. Plainly, there are Riddles in our Condition ....

Henry Killigrew's sermon before the King on Advent Sunday 1666 is an example of how observance of Advent was recognised in Restoration Anglicanism.  The sermon begins with reference to the Gospel of the day: Hosanna to the Son of David, blessed is he that cometh in the Name of the Lord, hosanna in the highest. These words are the Acclamation of the people, at our Saviour's entering in Triumph into Jerusalem, and part of the Gospel appointed for this Day, the first Day of the Church's Year, as appears by the Cycle or Round of Collects begun this Day. Christians, with good reason; observing yearly, double sort of year, an Ecclesiastical from the Advent of our Saviour, as well as a Civil from the Return of the Sun. For the Times and Seasons of the Church are measured, her spiritual Growths fostered, not by the Sun in the Firmament, but by the Sun of Righteousness, not by Planetary Motions or Influences, but by the Star of Jacob, whose Dawn, or Rising upon the World we at this...

Each Thanksgiving Day , laudable Practice  likes to give thanks for an aspect of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.  This year the subject for thanksgiving is William White, first presiding bishop of PECUSA.  His leadership guided the new church through the challenges of establishing its existence in the aftermath of the Revolutionary War and ensured its place in the social and cultural fabric of the new Republic.   Following White's death in 1836, Bishop George Washington Doane - a High Churchman with Tractarian sympathies - commemorated him in the sermon ' The Path of the Just '.  He interestingly compared White to Cranmer, celebrating "a wonderful resemblance".  Diarmaid MacCulloch reminds us that Cranmer is not a role-model "for uncomplicated courage".  Rather, it was Cranmer's caution, diplomacy, and quiet scholarly frame of mind, alongside his involvement in the affairs of the body politic, which ensured the re...

I was rather moved when last Thursday I saw a Tweet from the Cromwell Museum  marking the day as the anniversary of the death of Elizabeth Cromwell, wife of Oliver and mother to her husband's short-lived successor as Lord Protector, Richard.  Initially I could not quite grasp why reading about her burial in Northborough parish church (pictured) moved me. This post is an attempt to gather my thoughts and emotions. At the Restoration, Elizabeth had expressed to Charles II "humble and faithful obedience to your Majesty in your government", requesting that Charles would "out of your princely goodness vouchsafe her a protection, without which she cannot expect, now in her old age, a safe retirement". The Cavalier reaction at the Restoration explains the need for the petition.  The bodies of deceased Regicides - including Oliver Cromwell - had been disinterred and hung from the gallows.  Deceased members of Cromwell's family were also disinterred : the bodies of...

In Bethell's 1834 Charge to the clergy of the Diocese of Bangor we see what might be the most significant of the differences between the Old High Church tradition and the Tractarians.  In his 1834 Foreword to the Tracts for the Times, Newman portrayed an Anglicanism that had gone astray, "leaning on an arm of flesh instead of her own divinely-provided discipline", with abundant spiritual "deficiencies".  In Tract One , Newman similarly berated the Church of England for relying on "your birth, your education, your wealth, your connexion" rather than "the real ground on which our authority is built,— OUR APOSTOLICAL DESCENT".  This became not only the source of Tractarianism's contempt for 18th century Anglicanism, but also of the later Anglo-Catholic unease with what we might term 'ordinary' Anglicanism and the consequent perceived need to introduce liturgy, ceremony, and spiritual practices from the Roman tradition in order to r...

A few years ago the Reformed thinker Jake Meador wrote an article entitled ' The Invisible Anglicanism of CS Lewis '. The invisibility of Lewis' Anglicanism was, Meador said, to "miss the most basic fact of all about Lewis the Christian".  We might, of course, expect evangelicals and those Roman Catholics who Meador terms "Chesterton’s warrior children" to minimise and overlook the Anglicanism of Lewis.  Stranger, however, is that Anglicans should do so.  It is difficult not to think that a degree of embarrassment and awkwardness surrounds that fact that Lewis was a popular Christian writer.  This itself betraying a woeful ignorance of Anglicanism's past in which popular writings - such as as The Whole Duty of Man , the most popular religious work in 18th century England - shaped popular religiosity.   Lewis also, however, positioned himself against the theological project which came to define the post-1945 Church of England establishment, challengi...

That Anglican guides should avoid, and if possible forbid, spiritual "tension" is worth a heading to itself.  This evil is very prevalent, yet completely inconsistent with almost everything for which English spirituality stands.  Empirical guidance, not dogmatic direction; affectiveness curbed by doctrine; recollection, continuous and gentle, not set periods of stiff devotion; domesticity not militarism; optimism not rigour; all leads naturally into a balance, a sanity into what Julian called "full and homely" and what Taylor meant by "an amiable captivity of the Spirit" - Martin Thornton English Spirituality (1963).  If we desired a summary of the differences between Stir-up Sunday and the feast of Christ the King, it might be suggested that it is offered here by Thornton.  Stir-up Sunday is a gentle, yearly recollection of the approach of Advent.  It is marked by domesticity: the familiar words, the cultural resonances, the echoes in the landscape of t...

In Bethell's 1828 Charge to the Clergy of the Diocese of Gloucester, there is a strong Hookerian emphasis to its understanding of apostolic and episcopal order.  This is all the more noticeable as the Charge was given in the context of the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, amidst High Church fears of 'national apostasy'.  It is also illustrates the source of the pronounced differences between the High Church tradition and the Tractarians during the Jerusalem Bishopric controversy.  As Nockles notes: In traditional High Church ecclesiology, the abandonment of episcopal government by most of the foreign reformed churches in the sixteenth century was deemed highly regrettable, but unavoidable in the circumstances ... by formulating such an accommodation to their theory, High Churchmen were able to affirm their solidarity with the rest of the Reformation world. Thus, Nockles continues, "in the best traditions of Laudianism", the High Church tradition supporte...

The recent article ' A priest’s lament for the Church of England he loved ' caused a mild stir on Anglican Twitter.  Despite being presented as a conservative lament for the Church of England it is striking how the article's arguments are deeply unconservative and untraditional.  It is demonstrably lacking what Scruton identified as a key aspect of conservatism: "an awareness of the complexity of human beings".  Instead of discerning this complexity, it offers an ideological account of the Church of England and in doing so does that which all ideology tends to do: it flattens complexity and makes life monochrome in pursuit of political ends. Let us begin at the article's end, its conclusion regarding the Church of England: "But God speed the end of this blasphemous shambles".  In what sense can it be deemed conservative to wish for the death of the Church of England?  To again quote Scruton , conservatism begins with "the sentiment that good th...

On this day in 1558 Elizabeth acceded to the throne.  In  Ecclesia Restaurata (1660), the Laudian polemicist Peter Heylyn rejoiced in the Elizabethan Settlement, presenting it as a restoration of primitive purity: And now we may behold the face of the Church of England, as it was first settled and established under Queen Elizabeth. The Government of the Church by Archbishops and Bishops, according to the practice of the best and happiest times of Christianity. These Bishops nominated and elected according to the statute in the 25th of King Henry VIII, and consecrated by the Ordinal, confirmed by Parliament, in the fifth and sixth years of King Edward the 6th, never appearing publickly but in their Rochets, nor officiating otherwise than in Copes at the Holy Altar. The Priests not stirring out of doors but in their square caps, gowns, or canonical coats, nor executing any divine Office but in their Surplice, a vestment set apart for Religious services in the Primitive times, a...

In his 1825  Primary Charge  to the clergy of the Diocese of Gloucester, Christopher Bethell gave us a sense of the vision of the High Church tradition of which he was a stalwart.  In the extracts below we see how he defines this tradition as embodying an Anglicanism defined by the Reformed Catholicism of Articles and Prayer Book.  It is worth reflecting how the stormy partisanship of the Tractarians, and the reaction which they and their successors provoked, undermined the "moderation" (a term used by Bethell quite a few times in his Charge) of this vision.   The Articles, especially, were agreed upon, as their title declares, “for avoiding of diversities of opinion, and for establishing of consent touching true religion.” But their real meaning is not to be ascertained by studying them in connection with systems and opinions which had no influence on their construction, but with reference to the history of the times in which they were written, the contro...

Many thanks to The North American Anglican for publishing my latest essay, ' Feast of Faith: High Church Eucharistic Theology and Piety in the Church of England, 1800-1830 '.  What might perhaps be of some interest to readers is the essay's denial that a separate stream of (Scottish and American) Episcopalian Eucharistic theology can be invoked against the Reformed norms of the late Georgian High Church tradition.  This applies to both understanding the presence of the Lord in the Sacrament and the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist. On the Lord's presence: The consistent theme of Scottish Episcopalian writers during these decades was not how they represented a different stream of sacramental theology. Their emphasis, rather, was on how Scottish Episcopalianism shared the same sacramental theology as the English Church. William Skinner – later Bishop of Aberdeen and Primus – commenced his 1807 defense of the Scottish liturgy with such a declaration: "The Episcopa...

The Latitudinarians were moderates, stressing tolerance of diverging theologies and practices. There has never been a declaration from any Anglican body that the operative philosophy was to be latitudinarianism, but we see its influence throughout Anglican history. The words are from a recent post on The   North American Anglican .  To some extent, the statement is correct.  After all, the Formularies - BCP, Articles, Ordinal, Homilies - have a solid theological core that is robustly Augustinian, a theological school which (with some understatement) we might not immediately identify with Latitudinarianism.  That said, from both a Hookerian and Laudian perspective, it is right to be very cautious indeed about an account of Anglicanism which separates Formularies from history, which stands apart from the experience of how Anglicans have received these Formularies.   Alongside this, we might also consider if we would want Anglicanism to be 'liberated' from Lat...

It was the most poignant photograph of this year's Remembrance-tide in the United Kingdom.  Her Majesty the Queen standing before the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Westminster Abbey , accompanied by a military aide and the Dean of Westminster.   The photograph also captured an aspect of the Anglican experience that too often provokes embarrassment amongst or downright rejection by contemporary Anglicans.  Here was Westminster Abbey, a royal church dedicated prayer at the heart of national life.  The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a honoured focal point for the national memory.  Her Majesty herself is an anointed monarch and a faithful Anglican, whose messages at Christmas (and Easter Day past) almost certainly do more to commend the Faith than numerous episcopal statements.  The military officer accompanying her has sworn by Almighty God allegiance to her, and is ministered to padres, the majority of whom are Church of England clergy.  The photog...