Church Of England Research Articles

The Theology of the Church of England: The Origins of Anglican Orthodoxy

Church historians and theologians debate the nature and boundaries of the theology of the Church of England. This contested theological identity leads some scholars to merge the liturgical, ecclesiological, and doctrinal distinctions between the reformed Ecclesia Anglicana and other Reformation churches. This article surveys the development of the theology of the Church of England from the reigns of Henry VIII to Charles II, arguing that members constructed a liturgical, ecclesial, and doctrinal consensus that constitutes Anglican Orthodoxy. This broadly Augustinian identity draws from the Evangelical and Reformed reformations while maintaining its own distinctive dogmatic boundaries.

Leadership in the Church of England at a Time of Crisis: Toward a Deconstruction of Normativity

All too frequently, privileged white male power is unable to extricate its sense of normalcy from the leadership it exercises. This essay embarks upon a deconstruction of the modes of power and authority at work in the current leadership of the Church of England. This includes upholding a presumptive quasi-regal polity blended with the inevitable executive managerialism—what is termed an “ecclesiocracy” run by “ecclesiocrats,” supporting episcopacy. In beginning to deconstruct the power of the polity, we can see how alterity relates to what is held to be normative. This, in turn, poses searching questions for those who claim to hold presiding-mediating roles in English Anglican polity, which extends the life of some disputes and maintains averse hierarchical approaches to diversity.

The Ecstasy of Desire: Some Notes on Asceticism and the Church of England's Living in Love and Faith

Recently the General Synod of the Church of England agreed to approve liturgical resources— Prayers of Love and Faith—for blessing same-sex couples. This decision was the result of a long process of discernment concerning matters of sexuality and identity called Living in Love and Faith. This article aims to critique some of the background ethical and theological assumptions at work in the Living in Love and Faith resources, specifically the way the role of asceticism is conceived in them. I argue that while there are promising references to formation of desire through discipline and restraint in the LLF resources, their ascetic intuitions remain limited to world-related goods, neglecting the significance of bodily practices for God-related goods and for our final flourishing. Paying attention to the theological dimensions of Christian ascetic practice will also reveal the importance of concrete limitations for ascetic formation of desire. I argue that such limits are required for unravelling the transcendent capacities of human desire. At the end of the article, I make some suggestions as to how the revitalisation of not just ethical but theological ascetic praxis can be helpful in navigating the Church of England's current disagreement with respect to same-sex unions.

The Church of England and British Politics Since 1900. Edited by Tom Rodger, Philip Williamson, and Matthew Grimley

The Church of England and British Politics Since 1900. Edited by Tom Rodger, Philip Williamson, and Matthew Grimley

Re Bognor Regis Town Cemetery

Mr Reid died in March 2023. He had been an avowed atheist all his life and was resolutely opposed to the practice of burial; but because he had lost touch with his family, those responsible for his funeral mistakenly arranged for him to be buried in the area of Bognor Regis Town Cemetery consecrated for the rites of the Church of England. When his family learned what had happened, they petitioned for a faculty for his exhumation.

The Remarkably Unremarkable Life of England's First Black Parish Priest

Bryan Mackey (1770–1847) was for years the unremarkable, unremarked rector of a rural parish in Gloucestershire. He has, however, the distinction of apparently being the first priest with African ancestry to be ordained into the Church of England and who then served his entire career in Britain. His life history raises questions about historical racism within the Church and the wider society.

Grace and Conformity: The Reformed Conformist Tradition and the Early Stuart Church of England. By Stephen Hampton

Grace and Conformity: The Reformed Conformist Tradition and the Early Stuart Church of England. By Stephen Hampton

England’s Second Reformation: The Battle for the Church of England 1625–1662. By Anthony Milton

England’s Second Reformation: The Battle for the Church of England 1625–1662. By Anthony Milton

Butler and Hume on Religion

ABSTRACT For over a century now, Hume’s work on religion has been better known than Butler’s. To understand the full significance of Butler and Hume in relation to each other, it is necessary to be clear about what the historical record shows. Once we have established what the record shows, we are faced with the question of what we are to make of the record. Butler, obviously, was speaking as a widely admired priest of the Church of England. Hume was speaking primarily for himself as an aspiring man of letters. If Butler and Hume are read as adversaries, then history has already delivered its verdict. Hume’s opinion became better known, even though Butler enjoyed a long run of dominance in the nineteenth century. Finally, we must consider what we are to say to a public who remain as confused and distracted as ever on the great questions of God, freedom, and immortality. Hume and Butler advised that the public be presented with the evidence and then draw their own conclusions. There are many gaps in the record, but it is now possible to understand Butler and Hume as active in a dialectical process continued by Paley, Darwin, and their successors.

Communal reception of the spirit’s gifts of grace: re-imagining a decolonised Church of England theological education

ABSTRACT In this article, I examine the three classical models of theological education: paideia, Wissenschaft, and professional training within the context of the Church of England’s expectations for theological education as expressed through the new Formation Framework. Drawing on the publications from Eerdman’s series ‘Theological Education Between the Times’, I critically examine the three models through the lens of whiteness and argue that the classical models can each be used to oppress and exclude people of colour. In response, I offer a re-imagining of how the Church of England might think about a de-colonised theological education as the communal reception of the Spirit’s gifts of grace. I use this descriptive and teleological account to offer a renewed vision for the three classical models, showing how professional training might be re-orientated by a theological education focused on the Spirit’s grace; Wissenschaft might be re-purposed through the concept of receiving gifts; and paideia might be revived through the intentional formation of racially, socially, vocationally and denominationally diverse communities.

Characteristics of a 'common good building' Church of England Church

Characteristics of a 'common good building' Church of England Church

‘God is an equal opportunities employer- pity about the Church’: humour and the campaign for women’s ordination in the Church of England, 1978–1994

ABSTRACT This article seeks to untangle the relationship between religion, humour, and feminism by analysing the humour which underscored the campaign for women’s ordination in the Church of England. By examining the wordplay, the cartoons, and the physical objects through which humour was expressed, this article highlights the creativity which underscored the activism of these lesser-known activists. Through centring the experiences of these religious activists, this article extends existing scholarly conversations which seek to diversify understandings of who and what should be considered part of the ‘women’s movement’.

Ecclesiastical Policies on Education: A Democratic Game of Winners and Losers?

Abstract In the post-secular societies of Scandinavia and Great Britain, Christian denominations have had to reconstruct their identities as educational agents. This article focuses on the Church of England and the Church of Sweden, and their changed self-identification as expressed in their educational policy documents. Whereas the Church of England’s discourses are of partnership and business competition, the Church of Sweden’s discourses are about the Apocalypse and external threats. These approaches are analysed using Habermas’s concept of religion, identifying a transformation of religious language into secular argumentation to become viable in the secular public space. The question posed is: “Is theology exerting less influence over education in Scandinavia and Great Britain?”

What Shapes Ambivalence towards ‘Feminism’ amongst the Clergy?

Abstract In 1994 the Church of England ordained its first women priests and since 2014 women clergy have been appointed as bishops, a senior role in the Church’s ordained hierarchy. However, their acceptance into these roles has been highly ambivalent. How ambivalence manifests and the role of deeper beliefs about gender in the Church is under-researched, especially in understanding the positions of male clergy who oppose women’s ordination. This article draws on data sets from two separate projects conducting semi-structured interviews with both men and women in ordained ministry and compares the ambivalence towards feminism held by female clergy and theologically conservative male clergy. The argument unpacks how institutional and cultural factors intersect with tradition-specific beliefs to generate highly ambivalent views about feminism as a movement. The conclusion suggests ways feminism is mythologised and used to reframe conservative male clergy as vulnerable and as potential victims of misandry.

Solid Mass And Plain Exterior: The Ecclesiastical Architecture Of William Wardell In Victoria

ABSTRACT William Wilkinson Wardell was one of the most important architects of colonial Australia. A Catholic convert who had already extensive experience in working for the Catholic Church in England, Wardell relocated to Melbourne in 1858 with a large number of architectural drawings for ecclesiastical structures proving he was a distinguished Gothic revivalist. In Victoria, he established an extraordinary partnership with the first Catholic Bishop of Melbourne, James Goold, and despite being busily engaged at the Public Works Department, for over ten years he also maintained a successful private practice working on more than a dozen church commissions in the Gothic Revival style. Drawing on archival research including surviving architectural drawings, diocesan correspondence, and nineteenth century newspapers, the article reveals Wardell’s ability in blending English, Irish and French medieval Gothic elements that appealed to the local congregations for his Australian church designs. Furthermore, it demonstrates that his substantial parish churches manifested the strength and permanence of Catholic religious tradition, ultimately helping Bishop James Goold to lay strong foundations in the establishment of the Catholic Church in Victoria.

What Was the Restoration Church of England?

What Was the Restoration Church of England?

OutRage! Hypocrisy, Episcopacy and Homosexuality in 1990s England

The brief but bitter campaign to expose the hidden homosexuality of Anglican bishops in the mid-1990s was framed as a contest about hypocrisy, with bishops – whether suspected of homosexuality or not – condemned as hypocrites, and the Church of England as hypocritical. However, the activists behind this ‘outing’, and the media which covered the story with such enthusiasm, were similarly attacked for hypocrisy. A neglected moment in recent ecclesiastical history, it reveals the ongoing importance of hypocrisy in debates about the nature of faith and the authority of the church. Still more, it sheds light on how contemporary assumptions about authenticity both intensified the perceived importance of hypocrisy and increased the chances of being accused of acting hypocritically.

God's pronouns

Abstract The Church of England is currently debating what pronouns to use of God in liturgy. Opinions are strongly established on various sides. This article aims to slow the pace at which strong judgements are arrived at, through four sets of arguments. First, the distinctiveness of English compared with some other European languages and the danger of allowing the contingencies of English pronoun use to dominate the possible meanings of scripture. Second (drawing on the work of Janet Martin Soskice), the complexity of the figure of the fatherhood of God. Third, the significance of German philosophy of language in relation to negative theology and the particular ways in which the inadequacy of language about God has theological consequences. Fourth, a more philosophical discussion of the ways in which what is necessary or possible in one language cannot adequately be conveyed, as necessary or merely possible, in translation.

Enjoying what comes naturally: The Church of England and Sexuality in the 1930s

This article begins by outlining the changing approach in Anglican attitudes to contraception at the Lambeth Conference of 1930, where birth control was permitted for married couples and sex separated from the possibility of procreation. The logical extension of this teaching, as was noted by Bishop Charles Gore, was that other forms of sexual pleasure, including homosexuality, which was increasingly seen as a ‘natural’ condition, might eventually be sanctioned by the church. Later in the 1930s, a series of letters by Robert Reid to Cosmo Gordon Lang, archbishop of Canterbury, shows the beginnings of a campaign for a change of policy. At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Anglican writer Kenneth Ingram published Sex-Morality Tomorrow, which pressed for full homosexual equality and provoked calls to William Temple to suppress the book. 1940 proved an inopportune moment for reform of church teaching on homosexuality, which continues to elicit widespread controversy.

Vocation, Hypocrisy and Secularization: Iris Murdoch and the Clergy of the Church of England

This article examines the treatment of Anglican clergy in the novels of Iris Murdoch, setting this discussion in the context of Murdoch's own engagement with Christianity: one of sympathy without assent, yet with detailed knowledge of the secularizing theologies of the period. Clerical interventions in pastoral situations, politely tolerated in the earlier novels, are openly and robustly rejected in the later books. That pastoral care is, for Murdoch, vitiated by a desire for control, against which Murdoch set her ideal of self-emptying attention. Murdoch also dramatizes the loss of faith which forced, on some of the clergy, an inconsistency between outward speech and inner conviction. For some, the apparent hypocrisy is resolved by suicide or exile; for others, their vocation must continue as a witness to something absolute, even if they themselves can longer articulate its nature with any conviction. The Church remains necessary even if God himself is not.