Church Discipline in Seventeenth-Century England: Flourishing or Floundering? The Worcestershire Experience

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Church was a powerful institution in early modern times with courts to enforce its laws on the people at large. Most historians, however, consider its disciplinary machinery to be in decline by the 1690s, while Evan Davies claims there was a new vitality in the enforcement of religious conformity in the Diocese of Worcester after the Restoration. What were the nature and extent of the Church’s controls over society? Charge sheets in surviving consistory court books show the nature of church concerns and how these changed over time, while analyses of numbers summoned, their attendance at court and completion of business reveal the extent of its controls over society. The article traces trajectories over the seventeenth century to bring a broader perspective than Evan Davies to these questions. It sets Worcester within trends in other dioceses to confirm that the Church was a diminishing force in society.