laudable Practice

In our readings from Robert Nelson's The Life of Dr. George Bull (1713), we have previously considered Bull's reading of 'the prayers' (that is, Morning and Evening Prayer), and his ministry from the pulpit . Today we turn to his administration of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. While Nelson is still, at this point, discussing Bull's incumbency in the years following the Restoration, it almost certainly stands as a description of his administration of the sacraments throughout his ministry. In doing so it also reveals something of how the understanding of the Sacraments in Anglicanism throughout the 'long 18th century'. Nelson begins by drawing attention to the frequency of Bull's administration of the Holy Communion in his parish: He Administered the Sacraments of our Holy Religion with great Reverence and Solemnity; The Holy Eucharist, the Mysterious and the Rite and Perfection of Christian Worship, was not performed so often in this Parish, ...

So that now the question is not, whether the symbols be changed into Christ's body and blood, or no? For it is granted on all sides: but whether this conversion be sacramental and figurative? Or whether it be natural and bodily? Nor is it, whether Christ be really taken, but whether he be taken in a spiritual, or in a natural manner? We say, the conversion is figurative, mysterious, and sacramental; they say it is proper, natural, and corporal: we affirm, that Christ is really taken by faith, by the Spirit, to all real effects of his passion; they say, he is taken by the mouth, and that the spiritual and the virtual taking him, in virtue or effect, is not sufficient, though done also in the sacrament. Taylor's statement in his The Real Presence and Spiritual of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament (1654) is indicative of how he fundamentally shared with Ussher a Reformed understanding of the gift of the Lord in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. The similarity with Ussher'...

Having considered Thomas Wilson's Introduction to The Ornaments of Churches Considered, With a Particular View to the Late Decoration of the Parish Church of St. Margaret Westminster (1761), we now move to the body of the text. The same Laudian vision evident in the Introduction is also seen here. In Section III, the work reviews descriptions of church buildings of the patristic era. This extract, in thoroughly Laudian fashion, notes the patristic basis for use of the term 'altar': The upper Part corresponding to the Division of the Jewish Temple, was the Chancel; here was placed the Communion-Table, or Altar. These Names were promiscuously given, the former in regard to the Use to which it was applied, of partaking of the Communion on it; and the latter principally on Account of the Prayers and Oblations there made; and in this Part were Seats for those whose Office it was to perform the ministerial Functions. This is not the first use of the term 'altar' in the w...

In 1660, with the monarchy restored and the nightmare of the 1650s over, and as the Laudian Mark Frank rejoiced in the "miraculous restoring" of a "comely uniformity" to the Church of England's worship, the Presbyterian polemicist  Zachary Crofton lamented the re-emergence of the signs of Laudianism: Bowing to the Communion Table Symbolizeth with the worship of Pagans and Papists; those known Idolaters, especially in that order in which it was of late (and beginneth afresh to be) used among us, in his Majesties Royal Chappel, Lambeth Chappel, the Cathedral and many Parish Churches, whilst the Table must be made in the frame of an Altar, railed in, and advanced as an holy Inclosure; fixed at the East end of the Church; and furnished with Altar-Furniture, and Coverings, and Candlesticks with Candles in them placed therein. In the 1640s it had seemed as if the anti-Laudians had won the altar wars.  Parliament had decreed that rails must be destroyed, and the Holy...

Richard Montagu's  Articles of Enquiry  in the Primary Visitation of the Diocese of Norwich, 1638, provide evidence of how the Table against the east wall, and railed, did not prevent the customary approach of communicants to the chancel at the Exhortation during the Communion: Before the communicants ascend up into the Chancell out of their seats in the church, that exhortation is to be said, which in the Communion-book beginneth "We be come together at this time, &c.". And then this exhortation, "Dearly beloved, we are come together, &c.". When after this exhortation, the communicants are come up into the Chancell, before they dispose themselves to kneel in their severall places (which are orderly and decently to be appointed for them) this is to be said, "You that do truly and earnestly repent you of your sinnes, &c.". What makes Montagu's support for the custom particularly interesting is that his fellow-Laudian John Cosin had indic...

Yesterday's post on the Laudian use of 'Lord's Supper' brought to mind an extract from Ratzinger's otherwise excellent essay 'On the Meaning of Church Architecture' in  Dogma and Preaching: Applying Christian Doctrine to Daily Life , referring to St Paul in I Corinthians 11: the separation of meal and Eucharist that Paul is attempting here had radical consequences above all for liturgical history.  The Christian form of the liturgy, what is distinctive about Christian liturgy, becomes detached from its native Jewish soil, in which Jesus handed it down.  Since then, as J.A. Jungmann has demonstrated, no one called the Eucharist the Lord's Supper again until the sixteenth century; it was simply named the Eucharist. Ratzinger, put simply, is wrong. In a  homily  on I Corinthians 11, Chrysostom applies 'Supper' to the celebration of the Eucharist: Consider, when the Apostles partook of that holy Supper, what they did: did they not betake themselves ...

... his Altar, as the greatest place of Gods Residence upon earth. (I say the greatest, yea greater then the Pulpit. For there tis Hoc est Corpus meum , This is my Body. But in the Pulpit, tis at most, but; Hoc est Verbum meum, This is my Word. And a greater Reverence (no doubt) is due to the Body, then to the Word of our Lord. And so, in Relation, answerably to the Throne, where his Body is usually present; then to the Seate, whence His Word useth to be Proclaimed.) So said Archbishop Laud in 1637 .  I noticed these words being quoted on Twitter on Sunday past, the commemoration of Laud's martyrdom.  The implication was that Laud here was a precursor of advanced Anglo-Catholic views.  Is this the case? Firstly, we must note the context.  Laud is speaking against the charge of innovation, which he dismisses again and again in the speech as "pretended innovations".  He declares that he is upholding "the Practise and Rule of the Church of England since the ...