Anglicans

We've now completed the first section of our course, studying the Reformation in the 16th century, and today we will begin the second part of Reformation and Modern Church History. We're going to be looking at the church in the British Isles for three lectures. Today the church in England, and that part of the church in England that we can call the Anglicans, and the next time the Puritans in England and then the Presbyterians in Scotland. As we come to lecture 14 of the British Church, the Anglicans, I'd like to use a prayer from Jeremy Taylor, author of a very famous book called Holy Living and Holy Dying. There was one of the favorites of the missionary to India, Amy Carmichael, and we'll join together now as we pray, in the words of Jeremy Taylor, this prayer to the Lord, let us pray. Grant O Lord that in your wounds I may find my safety in your stripes, my cure. In your pain, my peace, in your cross, my victory, in your resurrection, my triumph, and a crown of righteousness in the glories of your eternal kingdom, amen. Let me ask you a question. What are the three most frequently reprinted books in the English language? What would you say? The Bible, the King James version of the Bible is certainly one. Somebody else pilgrims progress by the great Puritan, John Venian. What was the third? Most frequently reprinted book in the English language. Book of common prayer is probably a good answer, but I'm thinking more of a book that is not part of a church liturgy. Fox's book of mortis is very high on the list, but there's one you probably will not guess that complete angler by Isaac Walton, a book about fishing. It's something very interesting about those three books, though. The King James version of the Bible or the authorized version as he's called in England was first printed in 1611, pilgrims progress by John Venian in two parts, the first part 1678 and the second part six years later, and the complete angler by Isaac Walton 1653. So all three of those books come from the 17th century, one from the time of King James I, the complete angler from the time of the Commonwealth and pilgrims progress from the time of the restoration. And today, and next lecture, we'll be looking at the history of the church in England that forms the background for those periods that I have been talking about. Let's begin with the Elizabethan church. We have already looked briefly at Queen Elizabeth the first whose long reign helped to solidify Protestant control in England. Elizabeth became Queen in 1558 and ruled until her death in 1603. A contemporary tribute to Elizabeth the first is found in the famous book by Edmund Spencer called the Fairy Queen in which Queen Gloriana, as she is called in that long poem, is Queen Elizabeth the first and the nights of medieval romance are described in the poem to celebrate the ideals of Elizabethan English England. A modern assessment of Elizabeth the first is given by the historian Lewis Spitz. He says that Elizabeth, a young woman of 25, was greeted with tremendous enthusiasm by the people who rallied to her at Tatvee Oliva and as her half-sister Mary lay dying. Her 45-year reign saw England turn thoroughly Protestant and emerge as the leader of the Protestant states and you can read the further quotation from Spitz in the syllabus which says that even though some historians perhaps have exaggerated the contribution of Elizabeth to England's history nonetheless she is a very central and important figure not only for English history but certainly for Protestant history. Elizabeth was a great ruler, was she also a true Christian and people have discussed this for a long time trying to get to the heart and soul of Queen Elizabeth's faith. It's not easy to do that and sometimes Elizabeth is pictured as a rather pragmatic ruler who was a Protestant just because that suited her politically but I think as we study the life of Elizabeth and particularly as we read the prayer that I've included in the syllabus which was probably intended for her private use we can gain some insight into the fact that Elizabeth was more than a pragmatic Christian. She was not all the Puritans wanted her to be she certainly expressed in this prayer her faith and trust in God and her desire as she says in the prayer that in England there be a perfect reformed church to the furtherance of God's glory. So let's look at the church that formed during the reign of Queen Elizabeth in order to see if indeed that church was the ideal church that Elizabeth envisioned. There is an expression that is often used for the Church of England and it goes back to this time the expression is the Via Nadia, the middle way, celebrated in George Herbert's poem the British Church quoted in the syllabus and defended by modern Anglican J.I. Packer as an appropriate solution to the situation of the turmoil in the church during the time of Elizabeth and enjoyed by this Anglican pig following the Via Nadia. Anglicans celebrate this idea the Anglican church is right in the middle doesn't go off on this side like the Puritans doesn't go off on this side like the Roman Catholics but it stays right in the middle of the road. Now some people felt that that was not a good place to be the Puritans we're going to talk about more in detail next time but very early on there were people that expressed Puritans concerns the Puritans church would form later as part of the Church of England. First not a separate church but a group within the Church of England but even back in the days of John Knox you can see Puritans concerns being expressed John Knox feared that Church of England was not under Elizabeth becoming a perfect reformed church but a halfway house between Geneva where he wanted the Church to be and Rome where the Catholics wanted the Church to be. So to John Knox Elizabeth's Church was not that perfect British Church the golden mean celebrated by George Herbert in his poem but a kind of compromise and the Puritans will more see the Elizabethan settlement as a compromise the Church is only partly and inadequately reform one of the great Puritans early Puritans during the time of Elizabeth is Thomas Cartwright who was also one of the first Presbyterian champions in England a man who was gifted, able, and learned according to the New Oxford dictionary of the Christian Church. We'll come back to the Puritans next time because we'll see emerging within Anglicanism a very coherent and aggressive vigorous group of British Christians who want to push the English Church more toward Geneva, John Calvin Presbyterianism and we'll look at those leaders in the Church in our next lecture but today I'd like to talk more about the Anglican distinctions and distinctives. At first the Church of England was a national Protestant Church whose Anglicanism was not yet conceived nor its Puritanism yet clearly disowned. So the period under Elizabeth you really can't see yet a clear break between the two parts of the Church of England but the scenes are sewn for that break and next lecture we'll see that division taking place. By the first half of the 17th century however the distinctly Anglican position begins to emerge in theology, in church order, in public worship, and in spirituality. T.S. Eliot describes this moment well in his essay on Lancelot Andrews which is the little book in which T.S. Eliot first revealed his conversion to Christianity or to Anglicanism in 1928. We'll begin with theology and we know that the theology of the Church of England was set forth first under Edward VI but later under Queen Elizabeth first under Queen Elizabeth in the form of the 39 articles and those articles are distinctly reform. In fact the Puritans have no real arguments with the 39 articles. Westminster Assembly as we'll see later began its work by revising the 39 articles just to make sure that some of the statements in the articles which seem ambiguous would be interpreted in a reformed direction which I think is the way that those articles should be interpreted. So theology is really not an issue in England during this time. The Puritans and the Anglicans will agree on the theology of the 39 articles basically if moderately the reform confession of the Church of England. A difference comes however in church order, church polity. In here many different views will emerge mainly episcopal views of polity that mark the Anglicans Presbyterianism will be represented among the Puritans and Congregationalism as we'll see later. The Anglican position distinctive was the episcopal position on church polity. Set forth in a very important book by Richard Hooker. His book is called Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity and we read some of that in our book of source readings for today. Richard Hooker stressed the importance of scripture. Certainly the Bible is to guide and direct in church polity but Hooker also emphasizes the role of reason more than some other English ministers and people were willing to emphasize the role of reason. Hooker says that the gift of natural understanding with and reason is also from God. So you have scripture and you have tradition and you have reason and you put together those three sources of authority in establishing the polity and the order of the Church of England. This is a tremendously important book if not a very inspiring book. Here is an Anglican pig glorying in one of the more provocative passages of Hooker's laws of Ecclesiastical Polity. Perhaps you had similar reaction reading through some of those pages. So we come to public worship. We come to another very important point of Anglicanism. Public worship centered on the incomparable book of common prayer which has really been the one part of the Church of England that is held the church together all the way down to the present as much as the Anglican Church has stayed together because Anglican's worship in the same way. Book of common prayer although it's been revised some in recent years and throughout this century. Nonetheless the book of common prayer is the distinctive element in the life I think of the Church of England and Episcopal churches around the world and certainly is a wonderful resource of liturgical worship. It gives the Church of England a treasure that is distinctive and something that tends to unite Anglicans and Episcopalians everywhere. If Presbyterians feel very concerned about doctrinal consensus, the Anglicans feel that same concern about liturgical consensus. We tend to fight our battles over theology and worship is rather flexible although there's some issues related to that too that are very much of a concern to our Church. But in the Church of England theology can be treated more casually but not worship, liturgy is the place where the battles in the Church of England tend to be fought.

Quotation from J.I. Packer long before the age of fish and chips the book of common prayer was the Great British invention, nurturing all sorts and conditions of Englishmen and holding the Church together with remarkable effectiveness. Theology, Church order, public worship. I'd like to add to that spirituality and talk some about the spirituality, the devotion, the piety that marks some figures in the Church of England, people who have influenced the Church in many ways but especially in spirituality. Lancelot Andrews certainly is one. His private devotions have been a treasure of Anglican spirituality and Christian spirituality all the way down to the present. The private devotions of Lancelot Andrews was not a book that he wrote to be published. These were his private devotions, his prayers and those prayers found together in a little book in his own handwriting were found by his trustees after his death, a book that he had written, himself, prayers that he had written himself and used throughout his whole life so that they could hardly be read. He had so often turned to these prayers which he wrote. Alexander White, the Scottish Presbyterian minister said that the prayers of Angelot Andrews or the best prayers and that Andrews is the best composer of prayers in all the world of prayers, something you will want to look at sometime and read and perhaps use in your own private devotions, the private devotions of this great Anglican of the 16th and 17th centuries. And then John Dunn, John Dunn was the dean of St. Paul's Cathedral in London, one of the great churches of London back in his day as it is today and John Dunn was also a great preacher and a great poet, his devotions is a book of real importance. It's a book that he wrote about an illness that he had during which he thought he was going to die. I had read that book years ago but in recent years when I was taking treatment for chemotherapy and not able to teach, I read the devotions of John Dunn again and found this writing of this great Anglican minister tremendously helpful. Almost mighty and most merciful God he prayed who though thou has taken me off my feet has not taken me off my foundation which is thyself. To read the devotions of John Dunn you realize that the writings of this man have influenced people, literature, and even popular culture down to the present time. Therefore never sin to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee, he wrote in one of his devotions. That became of course the title of Ernest Hemingway's book on the Spanish Civil War and again in John Dunn's devotions. No man is an island, perhaps many people would know that quotation but have no idea that John Dunn was the first to say it and to write it in his book of devotions. John Dunn also produced great sermons, one of which was entitled Death's Jewel. It was Dunn's last sermon preached before the king during land to the year 1630 and has been called the doctor's own funeral sermon, preached the sermon while he was still alive and died shortly thereafter but in that sermon, Death's Jewel he has some remarkably helpful and inspiring things to say about both life and death. And of course John Dunn was a great poet as well, one of the great metaphysical poets of English literature. The next person I'd like to talk about is George Herbert. Herbert was also a minister in the Church of England. He was not minister of a great city church in London like John Dunn who was his friend but in a very small country parish. His short ministry was given over to serving God and his people in an out-of-the-way church and a rural part of England. He died as a young man but he wrote a book called The Country Parsons. It's one of the great books of practical theology in English literature. With the reform pastor Richard Baxter, we'll look at Baxter in the next lecture, Puritan and the country Parsons of John Dunn. You have two tremendously helpful books even for ministers today. In the country Parsons, George Herbert said he wrote the book not to set forth himself as an ideal or as a perfect pastor but to give him a mark to aim at. So the standards are high and George Herbert attempted in his own ministry to live up to his own standards. In the book he says that everything the person does is his ministry. He teaches in every way. He teaches directly through preaching and through categorizing and through visiting the sick and the people in his parish and he teaches through leading worship and he teaches indirectly in every other thing that he does in his life in the wife that he chooses and why he chooses that particular wife and what he does with his money and how he trains and disciplines his children and how he treats his neighbor. So you get in the country Parsons a kind of full view of what it means to be a pastor and to teach not only from the pulpit but among the people in the marketplace and in public life. Like Dunn, George Herbert was a poet. One of the great poets of English literature his poetry is collected much of it in a book called The Temple and I've included some of his shorter poems in the syllabus. I must say that I love reading George Herbert. Somebody said he loved words and he loved God and as you read George Herbert you can see a man who loves words and he loves God. George Herbert is just fascinating with words not only the meaning of words but the shape of words and the arrangement of the letters and how it all looks and some of his poems as you'll see in the syllabus take the form of a cross-dicks or have certain shapes as well as deep significant religious meaning. Now let's talk about Isaac Walton. He was not a minister. He was a layman, an iron monger as they said a man who traded in metal and hardware. He lived in London where he was a parishioner of John Dunn and later lived in Winchester where he is buried in the magnificent cathedral of that city. Isaac Walton had a long life, lived to be 90 years old and he not only was Christian layman who had a job and worked at it but he also was a writer, a biographer. He did not write poetry but he wrote some of the famous lives of English literature. He wrote the life of Dr. Dunn, the life which Dr. Samuel Johnson felt was the best ever written biography of John Dunn by Isaac Walton. He wrote a life of Hooker, a life of George Herbert, a life of one of the bishops of the Church of England, a man named Robert Sanderson, Bishop of Lincoln which Isaac Walton wrote when he himself was an old man. He included these words in that life of Robert Sanderson, which he wrote in 1678. He said, "'Tis now too late to wish that my life may be like his, for I am in the 85th year of my age, but I humbly beseech Almighty God that my death may be like his, and do as earnestly beg of every reader to say a man." Something very delightful about reading as a Walton, and this is the man who wrote the book on fishing that is so popular in English literature, a book called The Complete Angler, the title of that book which goes on as titles typically did in that period to almost a long paragraph. The title included a text, John 213, which was undoubtedly Isaac Walton's favorite text. Simon Peter said, "'I go of fishing,' and they said, "'we also will go with thee.'" And the book ends with another quotation from Scripture. First Thessalonians 4-11, study to be quiet. And Isaac Walton believed the best place to do that was out by a stream someplace with a fishing line and a nicely tied fly and a beautiful English day, and nobody to disturb you, but you could fish all day long and be quiet. Something which people must have found very difficult in the turmoil of the middle years of the 17th century. So if you're like fishing and like theology, get it both in the complete angler. The Anglican mind and soul, we try to, in a few words, get within the Anglican mind and soul as I have been describing it in the lives of these famous people of the Church of England. They're four points that I would make here. First is comprehensiveness. The Anglicans want to open the door, open the window. Perhaps as we come to the Puritans, we'll see a more narrow, not necessarily using that in a bad way, but a more narrow definition of Christianity, a more prescribed way of looking at the church. The regulative principle will begin to function in a very definite way, but in Anglicanism, the word is breadth, comprehensiveness illustrated by the people I have just described. These Anglicans are devout, learned, cultured, and moderate. Charles Williamson, his book for the Son of the Dove, describes Mr. George Herbert, who in a sedate Anglican manner renounced the world for God. That perhaps says quite a bit about the Anglican understanding of the Christian faith. Secondly, beauty in worship with the Book of Common Prayer by Kranner, which preserves so much of the beauty of the medieval liturgies, corrects those theologically and brings them into contemporary use in the reign of Elizabeth. Before that, Edward, in that the Church of England has a treasure, as I have said, of beauty in corporate worship, also church architecture, something that the Anglicans have excelled in. Other traditions will object to certain features of the architecture of Anglicanism, that certainly all of us would appreciate the beauty and the splendor of some of the buildings, many of the buildings that were erected for the use of the Church of England. The doctrine of grace, I think, is taught by these people, 39 articles certainly sets forth grace in an unambiguous way, and the sermons and poems of such people as Dyn Herbert make a clear presentation of the Protestant teaching of salvation by grace. But at the same time, we must admit that within the Church of England, there is the rise of a moralism. In seed form, even in the great devotional classic by Jeremy Taylor, holy living, and holy dying, which is much more clear on what it means to live for God than how one becomes a Christian and how life, eternal life, is given to us by God. That's not missing, but that book gives the impression that the Christian life is something that we have to constantly be working at in order to achieve. It's not wrong, but that needs to be supported by and undergirded by and surrounded by a great expression of the doctrine of grace. It's there in Jeremy Taylor, but you have to look hard for it. And then later, or really about the same time in the Arminianism of Archbishop Lloyd, you have the full-blown moralism that undercuts the doctrine of grace, of the reprobation, and at least led some Anglicans into a kind of works righteousness. There is a book by C.F. Allison called the rise of moralism, the proclamation of the gospel from Hooker to Baxter, which traces this move from two understanding of the gospel of grace to a distorted presentation. On the end, this lecture with a prayer, a quotation and a prayer from George Herbert. It's one that we can certainly join in. Lord, you have given so much to us. Give one more thing. A grateful heart. Amen. Okay, we've got a little more time today to talk about these things, and we usually do, so I hope you have some questions. Yeah. And as I was asking about freedom within the Church of England in terms of its worship, eventually there did develop three parties, the High Church, which is sometimes described as the Anglo-Catholic Church. It had its highest point, I think, in the Tractarian movement in Oxford with John Henry Newman who eventually became a Roman Catholic, but the High Church still continues and has great influence. The low church has usually viewed as the Evangelical wing of Church of England. And in the broad church, which is rather a latitude Darian, in its theology, the low church stands for something, and the High Church stands for something, and the broad church is just somebody has said the Torrey party at prayer. But in today's Anglican community, there is some flexibility. The Book of Common Prayer still binds the Church together, but there are different forms of it, and there are different ways in which it can be used. So there is some flexibility. Not as much as we would find in Presbyterian Church with a directory, which simply is for the use of the minister in designing the service. We don't have a Book of Common Prayer in the Presbyterian Church. We have a directory. It has some good things about it, maybe some disadvantages as well. But in World Wide Anglicanism today, as you know, there is much turmoil, and there are many movements and organizations that are trying to recover something of the traditional Anglican emphasis. Some people will say we go back to the earlier Book of Common Prayer before 1929, and we use that version, which is the more historic version. Others want to stress more. The return to theological orthodoxy. Their numerous renewal movements within Anglicanism, particularly in this country. In fact, a new one has just started, that I was reading about over the weekend, that feels that the other renewal movements have not been very effective. So there's another one that's supposed to be better, and accomplished more. I was especially intrigued at the headquarters for this new movement. It's Pauli's Island, South Carolina. Do you know where that is? It's a great vacation spot, but I have it thought of it as a center for World Wide renewal of Anglicanism, but perhaps they can do some fishing there, and lie out on the beach. And who knows what might happen at Pauli's Island? Jeff? Jeff is commenting on how important the Book of Common Prayer and his very words, language, is for Piscopalians, as they have tended to battle over that, and even divide over it. Like the use of the expression miserable offenders. If you're in the Old Book of Common Prayer, you're going to have to pray that, that you are a miserable offender. Some modern Anglicans don't want to be that miserable, so there's been a revision there. Well, I have tried to present this as I do in each part of this course. I've tried to present this in a positive way, and I must admit that I'm very attracted to people like Herbert and Dunne, and this whole tradition is one that I respond to the Book of Common Prayer. I am a Presbyterian. You'll find that out next lecture. And then particularly when we come to Scotland, but I don't feel that I need to say that all of this is bad. Much of it is good, and perhaps in some ways this emphasis on liturgy and worship, and beauty is something that we can learn from. Yes. Question is, what's the average church member in England thinking as all of this takes place? Well, there was the shift back and forth between Catholic and Protestant several times as we've seen already, and sometimes people just whatever was going on they would accept, because they knew it wasn't a good idea to question. That some people did question it, and died as a result of it or had to flee. By the time we come to Elizabeth, it certainly protested. These are not Catholic churches anymore. Catholics are under ground. They're still in England. The Jesuits are trying to keep something alive there, and Elizabeth and her advisors are always worried that there will be a Catholic uprising, and occasionally there were gunpowder plot to blow up the parliament, was undoubtedly a Jesuit or Catholic movement, which failed. But once the church is Protestant, then people go, but within the development of this history, some churches in certain parts of England and others in other parts of England will tend to go more the Anglican direction, and not the might say really good Anglican direction that I've described here. Some would be like this, but some more into Arminianism, as we'll talk about next time. Other congregations would have Puritan ministers. These are all church of England, so we don't have two churches yet. The two parties within one church. I was visiting the Paris church in Howard in Yorkshire last summer where Charlotte and Emily Bronte worshiped their father, was a rector of that church. It's also the church of William Grimshaw, the great Evangelical leader earlier in the Evangelical revival period that we'll talk about a bit later. It was interesting to look at the list of rectors going way back. I forget how far, but back at least to the Reformation, and on this board, in the back of the church, all of these rectors, ministers of that church, but at a certain place in that list there were three or four names left out, and just the word Puritans written in there. After the restoration, those Puritans, they were erased from the list, and the Anglican tradition was maintained. As we come into the early part of the 17th century, this is going to be more and more of an issue. Pretty soon, we'll see people dabbling over this, Anglican's versus Puritans, just as we've already seen Catholics and Protestants fighting. That's what it's all about in England, the Civil War, the Puritans versus Anglican. The question is, Dr. Packer in the lectures the last semester said that fiscal church government is more a matter of expediency. Well, I'm glad an Anglican said that, although Dr. Packer may be a Presbyterian in Anglican clothes, it sometimes looks like he is more of that than anything. But he was representing the Anglican church, and I think in the quotes I've given today, he would stand for it, and he is proud of it. But I do think this reflects Hooker's influence. Hooker said, don't forget the scripture. In fact, he begins that book with a tribute to John Calvin. John Calvin is the wisest man he says in the French church. But John Calvin is a man in truth is truth. So you have a little bit of a warning there that he's not going to hold quite to Calvin the way that some others would, and that's all right. We don't have to do that. We would agree that John Calvin is a man in truth is truth. But as Hooker develops his ideas, he wants to keep scripture foundational, but tradition and reason began to form a very important role in his thinking, and the Anglican way of developing policy is to put these things together. You might say it's expedient to have bishops get things done. It works a lot better than a general assembly. And yes, we think we can find them in the Bible too, but Presbyterians are going to work from another foundation, and at least we like to think that reason doesn't play much of a role in it. We can admit that it may not be expedient to do it the way we do it, but we like to think it's biblical. Of course, Baptists like to think that too, and everybody does. But I would think Anglicans would not be too upset to hear Packer say a lot of this has to do with expediency. They would say God gave us our wet in common sense, and we use it. One more minute or half a minute. Okay, next time we'll look at the Puritans.