Elizabeth's Injunctions and a New Elizabethan Anglicanism

On this date which marks the coronation of Elizabeth I in 1558, it is appropriate to turn to the Injunctions of 1559, the means by which Elizabeth set about undoing the Marian counter-reformation and establishing her ecclesiastical settlement. For those of us pondering what a New Elizabethan Anglicanism might look like, the Injunctions - perhaps surprisingly, mindful of the context and their, to say the least, robust tone - can be a source of wisdom, encouragement, and guidance.

Today I look at three of the Injunctions in particular and consider what they might suggest for a New Elizabethan Anglicanism.  

Firstly, the Injunctions restored Cranmer's vision that "often reading and meditation in God's Word" was at the heart of common prayer:

exhort every person to read the same with great humility and reverence, as the very lively word of God, and the especial food of man's soul, which all Christian persons are bound to embrace, believe, and follow, if they look to be saved; whereby they may the better know their duties to God, to their sovereign lady the queen, and their neighbour; ever gently and charitably exhorting them, and in her majesty's name straitly charging and commanding them, that in the reading thereof, no man to reason or contend, but quietly to hear the reader.

This Injunction is very much a summary of Cranmer's 'A Fruitful Exhortation to the reading and knowledge of Holy Scripture', which sits at the opening of the Book of Homilies.  Cranmer's homily ends with a beautiful call to "ruminate, and (as it were) chew the cud, that we may have the sweet juice, spiritual effect, marrow, honey, kernel, taste, comfort and consolation of them".  It is to this that the Injunction calls us when it exhorts that the reading of scripture is to be received "quietly", shaping what we believe and how we live. There is something here of Hooker's insistence that the primary form of preaching is the reading of scripture:

The Church as a wittnesse preacheth his meere revealed truth by reading publiquely the sacred scripture ... readinge it selfe is one of the ordinarie meanes, whereby it pleaseth God of his gracious goodnes to instill that celestial veritie, which beinge but so receaved, is never the lesse effectuall to save soules (LEP V.19.1 & 22.2).

'Preaching' - that is, expounding the scriptures from the pulpit - flows from and serves the reading of scripture at the centre of common prayer: not the reverse. Thus when the newly-ordained presbyter is charged to "preach the Word of God", it refers first to this reading of scripture in common prayer.  And so, Elizabeth's church robustly defended the ministry of 'non-preaching' ministers precisely because they did engage in the primary act of preaching - reading the vernacular scriptures in the congregation. 

For a New Elizabethan Anglicanism this is suggestive of the significance of maintaining common prayer in the absence of clergy or lay readers authorised to preach. Related to this - and also relevant to contexts in which there are ministers and readers authorised to preach - it similarly points to the importance of Mattins and Evensong as means of ministering this "especial food" of the soul. Here is the theological vision underpinning a New Elizabethan Anglicanism restoring the use of Mattins and Evensong.

Secondly, we might consider a curious aspect of the Injunctions, the provision it made regarding the bread to be used at the Holy Communion: 

where also it was in the time of King Edward VI used to have the sacramental bread of common fine bread, it is ordered for the more reverence to be given to these holy mysteries, being the sacraments of the Body and Blood of our Saviour Jesus Christ, that the same sacramental bread be made and formed plain, without any figure thereupon, of the same fineness and fashion round, though somewhat bigger in compass and thickness, as the usual bread and water, heretofore named singing cakes, which served for the use of the private Mass.

While not, it seems, implemented, it might be thought to indicate a backward look by the Elizabethan Settlement. A good case can be made, however, that it represents something rather different.   In Book IV of the Lawes, Hooker challenges those condemning the Church of England for retaining ceremonies also used by the Roman Church by pointing to "the example of Geneva":

Have not they ... the old Popish custome of administring the blessed Sacrament of the holy Eucharist with Wafer-cakes? (IV.10.1).

The use of wafers proposed by the Injunctions, therefore, reflected not only the practice of the Lutherans but also the Swiss Reformed churches. It was, in other words, a common magisterial Protestant practice. The Injunctions proposed the practice "for the more reverence to be given to these holy mysteries, being the sacraments of the Body and Blood of our Saviour Jesus Christ".  This was part of a shared magisterial Protestant concern for the reverent administration of the holy Supper, also reflected in the provisions of the Injunctions regarding the Holy Table:

and tables placed for administration of the Holy Sacrament ... so that the Sacrament be duly and reverently ministered ... And that the holy table in every church be decently made, and set in the place where the altar stood, and there commonly covered, as thereto belongs.

For a New Elizabethan Anglicanism it is a reminder of a magisterial Protestant commitment to "more reverence" accompanying "these holy mysteries".  This includes receiving afresh the Reformed eucharistic teaching which shaped BCP 1552/59 and 1662, also expressed in Article 28 and its "heavenly and spiritual" feeding "in the Supper". This is a rich source for joyfully, meaningfully, and coherently renewing and deepening contemporary Anglican sacramental teaching and piety.

Thirdly, the Injunctions conclude with a Bidding Prayer.  Its opening words set before us a generous vision of the Church catholic, even in a time of controversy and division:

Ye shall pray for Christ's Holy Catholic Church, that is for the whole congregation of Christian people dispersed throughout the whole world ...

As with the petitions in the Prayer for the Church Militant for "the universal Church" and "all they that do confess thy holy Name", here is a declaration - contra the claims of the Roman See - that catholicity cannot be equated to the papal supremacy.  At the same time, however, it is also a statement that the Roman church is part of "the whole congregation of Christian people".  As Hooker would affirm, "because the onlie object which separateth oures from other religions is Jesus Christ", the Church of Rome is "a limme of the visible Church of Christ" (LEP V.68.6 & 9). 

Likewise, to pray for "Christ's Holy Catholic Church" is also to pray for the non-episcopal Lutheran and Reformed churches. While the absence of episcopacy is a cause of regret, it does not remove these churches from "Christ's Holy Catholic Church". Thus Jewel declared of the "Zwinglians and Lutherans", "They vary not betwixt themselves upon the principles and foundations of our religion, nor as touching God, nor Christ, nor the Holy Ghost, nor of the means of justification, nor yet everlasting life". Alongside this, of course, is Hooker's famous acceptance that, while "none may ordain but onely Bishops", there are cases of "inevitable necessity" where other arrangements are valid:

where the Church must needs have some ordained, and neither hath nor can have possibly a Bishop to ordain; in case of such necessity, the ordinary Institution of God hath given oftentimes, and may give place (VII.14.11).

The Canons of 1604, issued after the union of the Crowns of England and Scotland in 1603 but before the restoration of episcopacy to the Church of Scotland in 1610, included a similar Bidding Prayer which, reflecting the changed constitutional context, affirmed the catholicity of a Scottish Church without bishops in the historic succession:

Ye shall pray for Christ’s holy Catholick Church; that is, for the whole Congregation of Christian People dispersed throughout the whole World, and especially for the Churches of England, Scotland and Ireland.

Such an eirenic vision of the Church catholic would make a New Elizabethan Anglicanism at once both robust and generous.  Robust in its understanding that the signs of catholicity - to be reverenced and protected - are the reading and preaching of the scriptures and the administration of the sacraments by an ordered ministry, with the confession of the creedal orthodoxy affirmed in the magisterial Protestant confessions, including the Articles of Religion.  And generous in recognising that "Christ's Holy Catholic Church" embraces all churches with these signs of catholicity: reformed and Roman, East and West, episcopal and non-episcopal.

Elizabeth's Injunctions, then, do indeed offer wisdom, encouragement, and guidance for thinking and discussions with regards to a New Elizabethan Anglicanism.  They flow from, and give shape to, a substantive Reformed Catholic vision with the potential to renew a contemporary Anglicanism too often - at best - indecisive as to the fact that it is an expression of magisterial Protestantism. And they suggest practical commitments for a New Elizabethan Anglicanism, with a restoration of Mattins and Evensong, sacramental teaching and piety deeply rooted in rich Reformed eucharistic teaching, and an eirenic, generous ecumenism in an age of renewed sectarianism and exclusivist claims. There is, of course, much else to do in terms of defining a New Elizabethan Anglicanism, but this might offer a not insignificant start.

Comments

  1. Thank you for this piece. I am wondering what your view is with regard to non-episcopal Reformed and Lutheran churches today. Back in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, one could easily look at the absence of episcopacy as "a cause of regret" stemming from "inevitable necessity", but that is hardly the case today. If, for example, Presbyterian churches or non-episcopal Lutheran bodies such as LCMS were willing to pursue it, they could certainly restore episcopal church government – but they are not willing to because they see church governance as a de jure matter and, so it would seem, building bridges via such an ecumenical gesture as simply not important enough. The argument from "inevitable necessity" no longer holds water, does it?

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    1. I take a Hookerian view on this. The necessity is, yes, in the past. Following those circumstances, however, a form of ecclesiastical order has emerged to provide ministry and oversight for those churches. It would not only be unrealistic to imagine that such churches would freely abandon that order - it is also possible that it would bring further disunity to the churches. This, however, does not prevent ecumenical dialogue and partnerships exploring how episcopacy can be generously restored (remembering, of course, that some Reformed churches in eastern Europe retained the office of bishop).

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