The mellow light that plays over the church of Lancelot Andrewes
It is a phrase from Eamon Duffy's The Voices of Morebath. Duffy could have said 'the church of Lancelot Andrewes' but did not: Duffy, we might suggest, refuses to forgive Andrewes for the first Gunpowder Plot sermon. Never mind that the Gunpowder Plotters were raging against and seeking to destroy that mellow light.
On this eve of his commemoration, it is - contrary to Duffy - fitting to give thanks for the mellow light seen in the church of Lancelot Andrewes. Mellow because it does not overpower us, in Herbert's words, by "outlandish looks" or being "undress'd" but, rather, cherishes and nurtures the modest, decent, and wise ways of the Reformed ecclesia Anglicana.
We might, of course, turn to Andrewes' sermons to exemplify this mellow light, or his Preces Privatae, or his defence of the Reformed ecclesia Anglicana in debate with Cardinal Perron. Alongside these, however, let me suggest three other examples of the mellow light playing over the church of Lancelot Andrewes.
Firstly, in his Visitation Articles of 1619, Andrewes maintained the Prayer Book's modesty in rite and ceremony, characteristics that would become established features of the Anglican experience:
Whether have you in your Church a Font of stone for Baptism, set in the ancient usual place, a decent Table for the Communion conveniently placed, covered with silk, other decent stuff in time of Divine Service, and with a fair linen cloth over that at the Administration of the Communion?
Whether is the Common Prayer said or sung by your Minister both morning and evening distinctly and reverently, every Sunday and Holy day, and on their eves, and at convenient and usual times of those days, and in most convenient place of the Church for the edifying of the people?
Whether doth your Minister observe the Orders, Rites, and Ceremonies prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer, in reading the Holy Scriptures, Prayers, and Administration of the Sacraments, without diminishing, (in regard of Preaching or any other respect,) or adding anything in the matter or form thereof?
Whether doth your Minister, in saying the public Prayers, and administering the Sacraments, wear a decent Surplice with sleeves, and being a Graduate, doth he wear therewith a hood, by the order of the Universities, agreeable to his Degree?
This was the consistent Anglican experience of the parish church and public prayer well into the 19th century: Prayer Book words, wooden Table, parson's surplice. For many, the modesty of the parish church and the use of Common Prayer persists as a significant feature of the Anglican experience, while at Mattins and Evensong Andrewes' description of 'decent' clerical vesture remains characteristically Anglican.
Secondly, the sober piety of Prayer Book and parish was embodied in the rite devised by Andrewes for the consecration of churches. At the font, the rite echoes the Prayer Book's Baptismal emphasis that the gift of regeneration in the Sacrament is to bear fruit across a lifetime:
Regard, O Lord, the Supplications of thy Servants, and grant that those Children that shall be baptiz'd in this Laver of the New birth, may be sanctified and washed with the Holy Ghost; delivered from thy wrath, received into the Ark of Christ's Church, receive herein the fulness of Grace, and ever remain in the number of thy faithful and elect Children.
At pulpit and lectern, there is the same emphasis on the Word preached and read bearing fruit in the lives of parishioners:
Grant that thy Holy Word, which from this place shall be preach'd may be the savour of life unto life, and as good seed take root and fructifie in the hearts of all that shall hear it. Grant that by thy Holy Word, which from this place shall be read, the hearers may both perceive and know what things they ought to do, and also may have Grace and Power to fulfil the same.
At 'Sacram etiam Mensam', the Holy Table, the prayer captures the sacramental piety of the Prayer Book, what it is to "take this holy Sacrament to your comfort":
Grant that all they that shall at any time partake at this Table the highest blessing of all, thy Holy Communion, may be fulfill'd with thy Grace and Heavenly Benediction, and may to their great and endless Comfort obtain Remission of their sins and all other Benefits of thy Passion.
The prayer for those whose marriages will be solemnised in the parish simply but beautifully summarises the ordinary, domestic piety (think Jane Austen) which would be a key part of the Anglican experience:
Grant that such persons as shall be here joyned together in the holy estate of Matrimony by the Covenant of God may live together in holy Love unto their lives end.
Finally, the prayer concerning those who may be interred in the church gives is a reserved but meaningful prayerful commendation of the departed - echoing the portion in the Prayer Book burial rite which Donne explicitly points to as prayer for the departed - recalling that so interred will be loved ones, neighbours, fellow-parishioners, those with whom we share communion:
Grant to such bodies as shall be here interr'd, that they with us, and we with them, may have our perfect consummation and bliss both in body and soul in thine everlasting kingdom.
Here, in other words, is Andrewes capturing and giving expression to the modest, sober Prayer Book piety that has fundamentally shaped Anglicanism.
Thirdly, we turn to the sermon preached at Andrewes' funeral by his friend John Buckeridge, then Bishop of Rochester. The final words of the sermon have an echo of Andrewes' own words noted above:
And so I end, beseeching God to give to us all, as He gave to him, our parts in the 'first resurrection' from sin to graces and to grant to him, and all the faithful and saints departed and us all with him, a joyful resurrection to everlasting life and glory in Jesus Christ. Amen.
Yes, the cult of purgatory was dismantled at the Reformation and the Book of Homilies, in that context, denied that prayer should be offered for the departed. Now, however, the spectre of purgatory having been banished, the ancient, primitive form of prayerfully commemorating the departed could return, as Archbishop Ussher implied:
Prayer for the dead, as it is used in the Church of Rome, doth necessarily suppose Purgatory ... howsoever they may deal with their own devices as they please, and link their Prayers with their Purgatory as closely as they list; yet shall they never be able to shew, that the Commemoration and Prayers for the dead, used by the ancient Church, had any relation with their Purgatory; and therefore, whatsoever they were, Popish prayers we are sure they were not.
The mellow light playing over the church of Lancelot Andrewes allowed modest and reserved (because the spectre of purgatory had so disordered the Christian imagination) prayerful commemoration of the faithful departed. Just as the departed were not to be banished to purgatory, so too they were not to be excluded from the church's prayer, anticipating the restoration of a commemoration of the faithful departed - "that with them we" - in 1662.
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