George Bell Research Articles

Episcopacy, law and government

This Comment, based substantially on a lecture delivered to the Ecclesiastical Law Society on 5 July 2023, will explore how bishops engage with the legislature, comparing the example of Bishop George Bell in the last century with a rather different example in the present century, namely Pope Benedict XVI and his address to members of Parliament in Westminster Hall in 2010. The comparison will, I hope, indicate some historic dimensions to the issues of episcopacy, law and government that are pertinent today.

‘To our earthly view Dietrich is dead’: George Bell's Eulogy for Dietrich Bonhoeffer

This article considers the eulogy given by George Bell, then bishop of Chichester, at the London remembrance service held in July 1945 for Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bell's eulogy offers a unique form of marking a death. On the one hand he presented a traditional biography of Bonhoeffer, whilst at the same time he depicted Bonhoeffer's life as not over, but as having moved into a stage of glorified martyrdom. The article explores how Bell argued that Bonhoeffer's death offered the potential for life to a post-war Europe, raising issues with van Gennep's understanding of the relationship between the living and a dead person who had had no proper funerary rites. The article thus seeks to explain how Bell marked Bonhoeffer's death by presenting him as a man, a potential assassin and a martyr, in an attempt to secure an eternal earthly legacy for a man Bell believed had offered the world life through his death. The article is followed by an edition of the text of Bell's eulogy in full.

British Christians and the Third Reich: Church, State, and the Judgement of Nations. By Andrew Chandler

In contrast to much existing historiography, which tends to emphasize Christian complicity or indifference to fascism, Andrew Chandler’s fascinating new monograph argues that British Christians pursued “a succession of initiatives which sought to protest against a … dangerous dictatorship and demonstrate sympathy for its victims” (pp. 51–52). We are introduced early on to the Anglican Bishop of Chichester, George Bell, the book’s main protagonist, due to his affiliation with Germany’s oppositional Confessing Church. Other important figures include Archbishop of Canterbury Cosmo Gordon Lang, Archbishop of Manchester (later Canterbury), William Temple, and the relatively sympathetic (to Nazism) Bishop of Gloucester, Arthur Headlam. The “political” pastors on the German side include ardent Nazis, such as the Reich Bishop Lüdwig Müller, whose German Church sought to eliminate all “Jewish” elements from Protestant theology; and non-conformists, such as the conservative Lutheran pastor, Martin Niemöller, and more liberal Swiss Reformed theologian, Karl Barth, whose June 1934 Barmen Declaration, which Niemöller and Bishop Bell also signed, became the founding document of the Confessing Church in its defense of traditional Protestant theology.

Michael Field, Pre-Raphaelite: One Play and Two Fair Beginnings

This article examines the development of Pre-Raphaelitism into decadence by focusing on Michael Field, whose verse play Fair Rosamund was published twice, first in 1884 (by George Bell and Sons) and later in 1897 by the Vale Press of Charles Ricketts. The article focuses on the legend of the ‘Fair Rosamund’ and how it was treated by Pre-Raphaelite poets and painters, both male and female. Positioning the Michael Field poets as Pre-Raphaelites, the article looks at how this poetic drama articulated a different decadent beginning, one inspired by and in communion with painting. 

British Christians and the Third Reich: Church, State and the Judgement of Nations, by Andrew Chandler

Since the 1990s, Andrew Chandler has published a series of important studies of the reactions of leading figures in the Church of England to Nazi Germany. In articles and essays, he has described and assessed their attitudes towards the persecution of Jews during the 1930s, the British government’s foreign policies during the decade, the Munich settlement of 1938, and the ‘obliteration bombing’ of Germany during the Second World War. In books and editions, he has been especially concerned with the deep engagement of George Bell, bishop of Chichester, with the pastors of the Protestant ‘Confessing Church’ who resisted Nazi attempts to create a comprehensive state church. In this new book he draws together, broadens and extends these earlier studies, to produce a wide-ranging account of the practical and moral responses of British churchmen to Nazi policies from Hitler’s seizure of power in 1933 to the Nuremberg trials in 1946. Although Chandler might not welcome an allusion to a once-controversial work, this is an investigation of the ‘impact of Hitler’ on the British churches.

KeithW.Clements. J. H.Oldham and George Bell: Ecumenical Pioneers. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2022. 235 pages.

International Review of MissionVolume 111, Issue 2 p. 372-373 Book Review Keith, W. , Clements, J. H. Oldham and George Bell: Ecumenical Pioneers. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2022. 235 pages. Eleanor M. Jackson, Corresponding Author Eleanor M. Jackson [email protected] Search for more papers by this author Eleanor M. Jackson, Corresponding Author Eleanor M. Jackson [email protected] Search for more papers by this author First published: 08 December 2022 https://doi.org/10.1111/irom.12438Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume111, Issue2November 2022Pages 372-373 RelatedInformation

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship, by Andrew Chandler

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship, by Andrew Chandler

George Bell’s Relations to the German Evangelical Church and the Problem of Information

George Bell’s Relations to the German Evangelical Church and the Problem of Information

British Anglicans and German Evangelicals: the search for reconciliation in the years after World War Two

ABSTRACT In this essay I discuss the encounter of the Church of England and the German Evangelical Churches in the aftermath of World War Two. Central to the relationship is the work of George Bell, Bishop of Chichester. He rebuilt links that had existed before hostilities started in an attempt to create a new theology for German political life. Bell was instrumental in the creation of a Religious Affairs Branch within the British element of the Control Commission Germany. As will be shown, he worked closely with the staff of the branch. In Germany throughout the period were Anglican members of the Royal Army Chaplains’ Department. At the start they played a role in linking the local German churches with the British occupation authorities.

The George Bell—Gerhard Leibholz Correspondence. In the Long Shadow of the Third Reich, 1938–1958, by Gerhard Ringshausen and Andrew Chandler (Eds.)

The George Bell—Gerhard Leibholz Correspondence. In the Long Shadow of the Third Reich, 1938–1958, by Gerhard Ringshausen and Andrew Chandler (Eds.)

George Bell, bishop of Chichester. Church, State and resistance in the age of dictatorship. By Andrew Chandler . Pp. xii + 212. Grand Rapids, Mi–Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2016. $35 (paper). 978 0 8028 7227 2

George Bell, bishop of Chichester. Church, State and resistance in the age of dictatorship. By Andrew Chandler . Pp. xii + 212. Grand Rapids, Mi–Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2016. $35 (paper). 978 0 8028 7227 2 - Volume 68 Issue 3

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship. By Andrew Chandler . Grand Rapids, Mich.: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2016. xii + 212 pp. $35.00 paper.

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship. By Andrew Chandler . Grand Rapids, Mich.: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2016. xii + 212 pp. $35.00 paper.

‘Playwrights Are Not Evangelists’: Dorothy L. Sayers on Translating the Gospels into Drama

Dorothy L. Sayers's twelve-part wartime radio life of Christ The Man Born to be King has been judged ‘an astonishing and far-reaching innovation’, not only because it used colloquial speech and because Jesus was a character voiced by an actor, but also because it brought the gospels into people's lives in a way that demanded an imaginative response. In spite of this, Sayers insisted that her purpose was not evangelization. Sayers's writing on theological aesthetics asserts that a work of art will only speak to its audience if the artist ‘serves the work’ rather than trying to preach. This article locates her thinking in the context of William Temple's sacramentalism and Jacques Maritain's neo-Thomism, suggesting that Temple's biblical exegesis was central to her approach in dramatizing the gospels. Finally an argument is made for Sayers's influence on mid-century thinking about the arts through her association with Bishop George Bell.

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorshi by Andrew Chandler

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorshi <i>by Andrew Chandler</i>

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship. By Andrew Chandler.

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship. By Andrew Chandler.

Andrew Chandler, George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship

Andrew Chandler, <i>George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship</i>

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship by Andrew Chandler

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State, and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship by Andrew Chandler

Australian Artists Abroad

Australian Artists Abroad

George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship, Andrew Chandler, Eerdmans, 2016 (ISBN 978‐0‐8028‐7227‐2), xii + 212 pp., $35

<b>George Bell, Bishop of Chichester: Church, State and Resistance in the Age of Dictatorship</b>, Andrew Chandler, Eerdmans, 2016 (ISBN 978‐0‐8028‐7227‐2), xii + 212 pp., $35

Constructing Space for Dissent in War: The Bombing Restriction Committee, 1941–1945

Abstract The prevailing view of the British public’s response to the RAF bomber offensive during the Second World War suggests that there was widespread and even enthusiastic support for the bombing aside from a small number of prominent individuals, chiefly the writer Vera Brittain and the Bishop of Chichester, George Bell. This article challenges the view that there was little overt dissent over the bombing campaign by looking at the origins, activity and impact of the Bombing Restriction Committee, the title given in 1942 to the Committee for the Abolition of Night Bombing founded in August 1941. The Committee undertook a wide range of activity in protest first against night-bombing, and then more generally against the RAF’s shift to area bombing in 1941–2. The article examines the network of supporters that the committee developed and the nature and extent of its propaganda, and addresses the question of why the protest against a major aspect of British strategy was allowed to continue throughout the war without serious interference. The result suggests that the ideal of a ‘democratic consensus’ in Britain was not realised on this issue; instead it can be argued that official tolerance for protest demonstrated more clearly Britain’s democratic credentials, while it allowed the Committee to keep alive the evolving humanitarian concern of sections of pre-war British society, and to sustain those concerns on into the nuclear age.