laudable Practice

Published in Latin, English, and French on 13th May 1644, ' The Declaration of the most Excellent and Potent Prince, Charles King of Great Britain, sent to the Protestant Churches beyond the Seas ' offers a significant insight into the Caroline defence of the Elizabethan Settlement.  In face of the Parliamentarian dismantling of the Elizabethan Settlement - beginning in 1643 and completed in 1645 - Charles addressed "the Protestant Churches beyond the Seas", presenting "the Anglicane Church" as the jewel of the Reformed Churches, its liturgy and discipline admired by those Churches beyond the Seas.  This was a classic Conformist understanding , shared by both Laudians and non-Laudians, and to be repeated by Conformist apologists after the Restoration (e.g. Durel's work being an obvious and significant example). Another feature shared by 'Reformed Conformists' and Laudians is the invocation of the Lutherans of Germany, Denmark, and Sweden, togeth...

The commemoration of the Royal Martyr is an appropriate occasion on which to reflect on the oft-repeated suggestion that the Laudians supported 'absolutism'.  Leaving aside the fact that 'absolutism' is a notoriously ill-defined term, it may be rather more appropriately applied to some later Enlightenment monarchs who rejected the checks and balances provided by traditional communal and corporate institutions which early modern monarchies such as the Stuarts necessarily relied upon. I have previously pointed to a High Church vision of constitutional order with a mixed polity, derived from Hooker,  flowing Lancelot Andrewes, through the Laudians, and into the 18th century. Indeed,  Waterland's 1723 Restoration Day sermon and Swift's 1725 Royal Martyr Day sermon illustrate how this commitment to a Hookerian mixed constitution found expression in High Church critique of the Personal Rule.   What, however, of Laud himself, so often associated with the accusation o...

Many thanks to The Critic for carrying my article for Holocaust Memorial Day, calling for it to be observed by Christians as a day of lament and penitence.  At the heart of the article is the suggestion that A Commination in BCP 1662 (or the alternative penitential liturgies in other versions of the Book of Common Prayer e.g. Ireland 1926 ) be used by Anglicans on this day as an expression of our penitence. Holocaust Memorial Day confronts Christians with a shameful history of anti-Semitism, a history that was invoked by the instigators of the Holocaust and which motivated some in Nazi-occuppied territories to collude with this evil. The Church of England’s 2019 report on Christian-Jewish relations, ‘ God’s Unfailing Word ’, states that Christians over centuries “have used Christian doctrine in order to justify and perpetuate Jewish suffering”. The report continues to say that this “has fostered attitudes of distrust and hostility among Christians towards their Jewish neighbours,...

As part of  the series of weekly posts from  the responses to Tract XC by Old High bishops in the visitation charges of the early 1840s, today we continue  consideration of  the  charge given in 1842 by Henry Phillpotts  (Bishop of Exeter 1831-69). These charges are  a rich seam of Old High teaching.  The focus of these posts is not so much on the well-known critique of Tract XC articulated in the charges but, rather, on what these visitation charges reveal about the teaching, piety, concerns, and vitality of the Old High tradition nearly a decade after the emergence of the Oxford Movement. In today's extract, Phillpotts refutes those evangelicals who, in response to Tractarianism, adopted a low view of the sacraments (contrary, it must be said, to 18th century evangelicals such as Charles Simeon).  Phillpotts contrast such "ultra-Protestant" views - which he compares, in a footnote, to the sacramental teaching of Socinus (a point also made b...

... beseeching thee to inspire continually the universal Church with the spirit of truth, unity, and concord: And grant, that all they that do confess thy holy Name may agree in the truth of thy holy Word, and live in unity, and godly love. Cranmer wrote these words in the very midst of the passionate disputes and bloody violence of the Reformation divisions. The significance of the petition is perhaps illustrated by  Diarmaid MacCulloch's suggestion that "the Reformation might indeed be viewed simply as two centuries of warfare". Against this background, we might have a greater appreciation of the words of the author of this prayer, a man described elsewhere by MacCulloch as a "cautious, well-read humanist", with a warm commitment to "concord by discussion". It is this which may have been a source for the deeply eirenic quality of the petition in the Prayer for the Church Militant. This deeply eirenic quality also had profound theological depth whic...

In the preface to his The Psalter of David (1647), Jeremy Taylor provided a beautiful account of how praying the psalter could renew a bitterly divided Christendom in "the Communion of charity". Written amidst the violent confessional conflicts that marked the Wars of the Three Kingdoms in these Islands and as the viciously bloody Thirty Years War drew to a close, Taylor urged Christians to see in their shared praying of the psalms a means for "the advancement of an universall Communion".  Taylor's words continue to resonate, emphasising the significance of Christians across ecclesial traditions praying and reciting the psalter. It suggests that, as Anglican Christians, we can be closest, in "the Communion of charity", to our brothers and sisters across the Christian traditions - Gaelic-speaking Reformed congregations in the Western Isles of Scotland, ancient Benedictine monastic communities in the heart of Europe, Ethiopian Orthodox praying in church...

Continuing the series of sermons from those associated with the Hackney Phalanx, an extract from another episcopal consecration sermon - this time the 1824 consecration of Blomfield for Chester - John Lonsdale (ordained 1815, Principal of King's College, London 1839, consecrated Bishop of Lichfield in 1843, died 1867). As can be seen from the title page of this sermon, Lonsdale was chaplain to Charles Manners-Sutton, Archbishop of Canterbury and a strong supporter of the Hackney Phalanx. This extract struck me as quite significant because of assumptions routinely made regarding the Phalanx and the Old High tradition. Lonsdale - in a manner that reminds me of Tom Holland's Dominion - points to the significance of the rejection of Christianity by the Roman elite. Contra Gibbon (referenced in a footnote in the sermon), Lonsdale hails this rejection as evidence of the divine origins of Christianity.  It is also revealing in terms of how the Hackney Phalanx viewed the Churc...

In this final extract from the sixth of his 1844 Bampton Lectures,  An inquiry into the means of grace, their mutual connection, and combined use, with especial reference to the Church of England , Jelf - one of those whom Nockles lists as the 'Zs', the post-1833 continuation of the Old High tradition - summarises what he describes as "this high mystical and spiritual doctrine" of the Sacrament. That phrase alone should make us again think of Nevin's account of the High Reformed doctrine of the Supper, The Mystical Presence (1846). Or, as Jelf puts it here, in more than an echo of Calvin, "uniting us mystically, but truly, with the glorified nature of our blessed Lord": This grace we hold to be not a mere suggestion of goodness, nor mere instruction, nor an implanting of motives, nor a sense of mere gratitude in the remembrance of Christ's death; but the real reception of the Body and Blood of Christ, whatever that may mean, "after an heavenly...

In his account of the life of Laud, Cyprianus anglicus (1668), the Laudian Peter Heylyn addresses the accusation of 'Popery' levelled at the Archbishop by his opponents in church and state. Heylyn is clear, of course, that such accusations had no basis whatsoever, for Laud was committed to the defence of the Church of England, what Heylyn describes as "the true Protestant religion".  This, Heylyn states, was not at all contradicted by Laud's opposition to a populist, sectarian anti-popery stance. Rather, such opposition stood in the best traditions of the reformed Church of England. Heylyn first considered how Laud discouraged and used his influence against publications with "exasperating passages" which condemned the Pope as 'antichrist': he was not pleased that the Pope should be any longer stigmatized by the name of Antichrist; and gave a strict Charge unto his Chaplains, That all exasperating Passages (which edifie nothing) should be expunge...

Today we continue consideration of  the  charge given in 1842 by Henry Phillpotts ,  Bishop of Exeter 1831-69. This is part of  the series of weekly posts from a rich seam of Old High teaching, the responses to Tract XC by Old High bishops in the visitation charges of the early 1840s.  The focus of these posts is not so much on the well-known critique of Tract XC articulated in these charges but, rather, on what these visitation charges reveal about the teaching, piety, concerns, and vitality of the Old High tradition nearly a decade after the emergence of the Oxford Movement.  Phillpotts provides a robust Old High view of the the visible Church: "the true Christian life is not an individual, but a corporate life". What is significant, however, is that he sees no need to couch this in terms beyond the Formularies (a stark contrast with the Tractarians). He invokes Article 19 and provides a Reformed Catholic account of the visible Church which would be as eq...

As touching the Government of the Church, I am verily persuaded that the Government Episcopal is the only Right and Apostolick Form. So declared John Spottiswoode, Archbishop of Saint Andrews 1615-39, in his last will and testament at his death in 1639.  It is, of course, what we would expect of a Laudian.  The words were quoted in the life of Spottiswoode, prefacing The History of the Church of Scotland . Again we would expect these words to be quoted as the author of the life was another Laudian, Brian Duppa (Bishop of Salisbury 1641-60, Bishop of Winchester 1660-62). Before, however, regarding this as a high-flying Laudian view of episcopacy contrasting with Hooker's caution and moderation - and thus another example of supposed Laudian innovation - we should take care to read both Spottiswoode and Duppa on the post-Reformation Church of Scotland.  Consider Spottiswoode's defence of the restoration of episcopacy in Scotland under James VI: For did men understand how thi...

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?  The question was asked by Newman in Tract One . It carries the implication, of course, that the pre-1833 Church of England and Ireland was dependent upon its established status and that without this status it had little or no theological rationale for its ministry. Tract One is a quite brilliant piece of ecclesiastical propaganda, significantly contributing to the perverse image of Georgian Anglicanism which the Tractarians - with assistance from low church evangelicals - would enthusiastically promote. However, as laudable Practice has previously suggested, such an account of pre-1833 Ang...

In the sixth of his 1844 Bampton Lectures,  An inquiry into the means of grace, their mutual connection, and combined use, with especial reference to the Church of England , Jelf - one of those whom Nockles lists as the 'Zs', the post-1833 continuation of the Old High tradition - addresses the nature of the Eucharistic sacrifice. Jelf here rehearses well established Old High teaching, affirming Eucharistic sacrifice - prayer, alms, elements, praise and thanksgiving - but denying any offering of Christ's Body and Blood.  The caution he expresses at the outset regarding any offering of the consecrated elements reflects the mainstream Old High tradition, which distanced itself from John Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice (1724) and the enthusiasm of some advanced Non-Jurors for that work. Instead, in typical Laudian and Old High fashion, Jelf refers to a commemorative - not propitiatory - sacrifice.  This also, of course, reaffirms the Protestant nature of the Old High traditio...

In 1618, the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland accepted the Five Articles of Perth , proposed by James VI/I. These Articles restored to the Scottish Church practices quite common elsewhere in Churches of the Reformation: kneeling to receive the holy Sacrament; administering holy Communion to the sick in the home; administering the Sacrament of Baptism, when necessary, in the home; Confirmation administered by bishops; and observance of the festivals of our Lord. Contrary to the populist polemics found in Presbyterian histories, these Articles were not 'imposed' on the Scottish Church. No, the Church of Scotland acceded to the direction of the magistrate who had a concern for the good order of the ecclesiastical estate.  As the preacher at the Perth Assembly noted, such a synodical process was right and proper, "for what Christian king did euer determine in ecclesiasticall matters any thing without aduice of his clergie?". The preacher was John Spottiswoode, A...

Today laudable Practice resumes the series of weekly posts from a rich seam of Old High teaching, the responses to Tract XC by Old High bishops in the visitation charges of the early 1840s.  The focus of these posts is not so much on the well-known critique of Tract XC articulated in these charges but, rather, on what these visitation charges reveal about the teaching, piety, concerns, and vitality of the Old High tradition nearly a decade after the emergence of the Oxford Movement. Having considered the 1842 charge of Newman's diocesan, Bagot of Oxford , we turn now to the charge given in the same year by Henry Phillpotts , Bishop of Exeter 1831-69. In this extract from the charge, Phillpotts expounds an enduring Old High conviction - that the Prayer Book offers a much richer proclamation of the Gospel than a reliance on preaching alone. Central to this was the recognition of Prayer Book as deeply rooted in evangelical, catholic faith, against sectarian alternatives. Here Phillp...

From The History of the Church of Scotland  (published posthumously in 1655) by John Spottiswoode, Archbishop of St. Andrews 1618-39, the account of an incident at the episcopal consecration of the author and two other Scottish clerics in 1610.  James VI/I had restored bishoprics to the Church of Scotland but - as the King himself stated (also quoted by Spottiswoode) - "the adversaries mouths be stopped, who said that he did take upon him to create Bishops, and bestow Spiritual Offices, which he never did nor would he presume to do, acknowledging that authority to belong to Christ alone, and those he had authorized with his power".  James therefore directed the Bishops of London, Ely, and Bath to consecrate the Scotch clerics, the absence of the Archbishops of Canterbury and York providing assurance that the Church of England was not claiming jurisdiction over the Church of Scotland. That said, the Archbishop of Canterbury - Richard Bancroft - did crucially intervene...