'The power of the Holy Spirit was perfected in the Virgin's weakness': an 1851 Old High sermon against the Immaculate Conception

In an 1851 sermon preached in Westminster Abbey on the feast of the Purification of Saint Mary the Virgin, 'On a Recent Proposal of the Church of Rome to make a New Article of Faith', Christopher Wordsworth - a leading figure in the Old High tradition, Bishop of Lincoln 1869-85 - addressed the process which led to the Bishop of Rome promulgating the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in 1854. In this extract, Wordsworth expounds how refusal to accept this doctrine is rooted in the Scriptural proclamation and creedal confession of the Incarnation. Not only is the mystery of the Incarnation not aided by the doctrine Immaculate Conception. In fact, as Wordsworth emphasises, the mystery and grace of the Incarnation is more faithfully acknowledged by a recognition that the Blessed Virgin is, with us, entirely dependent upon the Redeemer. This also points to the grounds for what Wordsworth terms "the true honour of the Blessed Virgin", her overshadowing by the Holy Spirit as she became Mother of the world's Redeemer.

Let me now invite your attention to the consequences which result from the doctrine that the Blessed Virgin was exempt from original sin.

This doctrine disturbs the relation between the Incarnate Word and His human Mother.

It would make her a sharer in His incommunicable prerogative, that of original sinlessness. It would deprive Him of His right to be called her Saviour and Redeemer; and so is injurious to His claim to be the Saviour and Redeemer of the World.

It would mar the contrast between the first and Second Adam. It could no longer be said, that as the first Adam was the source of guilt, so the Second Adam is the source of purity. The Virgin would be the source, and not Christ.

It would disturb the relation subsisting between the Holy Ghost and the Incarnate Word; and, through Him, to the whole family of man. If the Blessed Virgin was sinless, if her human substance was not infected with any original taint, then the sinlessness of Christ's human nature would not be due solely and immediately to the operation of the Holy Ghost, over-shadowing the Blessed Virgin at the time when she conceived her Saviour in her womb ...

Let us listen to Scripture. Christ took upon Him human flesh of the substance of the Virgin His Mother, who was born in original sin; but the flesh which He took was not sinful, it was purified by the Holy Ghost at the time of her conception, and not before. Hear the voice of the Angel to Mary: "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore that Holy Thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." The power of the Holy Spirit was perfected in the Virgin's weakness.

It is necessary to salvation to believe that Christ took "our nature of the substance of the Virgin Mary His Mother." It is also firmly to be maintained, that the flesh which he assumed of the substance of the Virgin His Mother, was free from all spot of sin, and that the cause, the only cause of this sinlessness, was the Holy Ghost.

Why I support the ordination of women: a High Church reflection

A number of commenters on this blog have asked about my occasional expressions of support for the ordination of women to all three orders. With some hesitation, I have decided to post a summary of my own views on this matter. The hesitation is because I have sought on this blog to focus on issues and themes which can unify those who identify with or have respect (grudging or otherwise!) for what we might term 'classical' Anglicanism (the Anglicanism of the Formularies and - yes - of the Old High Church tradition). Some oppose the ordination of women (and I have friends and colleagues who do so, Anglo-Catholic, High Church, and Reformed Evangelical). Some of us support it (again, friends and colleagues covering a wide range of theological traditions). Below, I have organised my thinking around 5 points (needless to say, no reference to Dort is implied). 1. The Declaration for Subscription required of clergy in the Church of Ireland states: (6) I promise to submit ...

How the Old High tradition continued

Charles Gore's 1914 letter to the clergy of his diocese, ' The Basis of Anglican Fellowship ', can be regarded as a classical expression of the Prayer Book Catholic tradition. A key part of the letter - entitled 'Romanizing in the Church of England' - addressed the "Catholic movement", questioning beliefs and practices within it which tended to "a position which makes it very difficult for its extremer representatives to give an intelligible reason why they are not Roman Catholics". Gore provides the outlines of an alternative account and experience of catholicity within Anglicanism, defined by three characteristics. What is particularly interesting about these characteristics is their continuity with the older High Church tradition. Indeed, the central characteristic as set out by Gore was integral to High Church claims over centuries: To accept the Anglican position as valid, in any sense, is to appeal behind the Pope and the authority of t...

'Whether the Lutheran Churches have right Ordinations and perfect succession of Bishops': Jeremy Taylor, 'Episcopacy Asserted', and Lutheran orders

Amidst the bitter controversies over episcopacy in the Three Kingdoms during the early 1640s, controversies which had become war in Scotland in 1637 and then in England in 1642, Jeremy Taylor wrote his Laudian defence of episcopal order, The Sacred Order and Offices of Episcopacy Asserted and Maintained . He proposed in this work that the non-episcopal Reformed churches could have had episcopally-ordered clergy: Those good people might have had order from the bishops of England or the Lutheran churches, if at least they thought our churches catholic and Christian. Leaving aside the reality that, for example, French Protestants would have been placed in an invidious political position if they had done as Taylor proposed, it is the reference to "the Lutheran churches" which is significant. To begin with, a large portion of the Lutheran churches - those in the German lands - were governed by a system of superintendency. It is almost inconceivable that Taylor was not aware of th...

laudable Practice

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