Communion and Community: Exclusion from Communion in Post-Reformation England

2000 ◽  
Vol 51 (4) ◽  
pp. 721-740
Author(s):  
CHRISTOPHER HAIGH

On Whit Sunday 1569, after evening service, William and Geoffrey Soden went to see their vicar. They expected a difficult encounter, and took along three of their neighbours of Swalcliffe near Banbury for moral support. The Sodens had been wrangling between themselves and with their mother, and there was also some dispute with the vicar, Richard Crowley. William now told the vicar that they wished to receive communion next day, and asked ‘to know if he would admit them thereunto’. Crowley replied ‘I will not’, and said it was ‘because they came not penitently’. He explained in court later that ‘the said William and Geoffrey Soden did not come to this respondent Anno 1569 penitently or in brotherly reconciliation, but obstinately, with vehement words, as is known to the whole company then present’. Crowley had shown the Sodens the Book of Common Prayer, ‘and exhorted them in the presence of those men according to the rule of the said Book, but the said William and Geoffrey Soden regarded it not but continued still in their obstinacies’. There was more: the vicar declared ‘I have to examine you on your belief, the articles of your faith and the Ten Commandments, and do not know how you could answer.’ The brothers were furious: ‘Yea, Master Vicar, that ye go about to shame us before the whole people’, declared Geoffrey, and they stomped off ‘uncharitably and obstinately, with great threatening words’.The Swalcliffe rows simmered on.

2014 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Raymond Potgieter

The Book of Common Prayer (BCP) is the first introduction to Anglican belief and liturgy for many. More specifically, the Book of Common Prayer of 1662 contains the traditional catechism of the Church of England, enjoining catechumens to receive training and instruction in basic doctrines and Christian living. This takes place in the contexts of the liturgy and the more comprehensive doctrinal statements of the 39 Articles of Religion. Anglican religion traditionally allowed its members to verbalise their faith in both ritual and confession, thus serving the church and not so much life in the world. A revisit of the intentions of the catechism within its historical and prayer book contexts will show that it essentially expresses lasting truths of the Christian faith. In a world increasingly divorced from particular Christian expressions, the Anglican Church needs to rethink its particular use of the catechism for its continued relevance in meeting the questions and challenges Anglicans face daily.


Author(s):  
Charles Hefling

This book surveys the contents and the history of the Book of Common Prayer, a sacred text which has been a foundational document of the Church of England and the other churches in the worldwide community of Anglican Christianity. The Prayer Book is primarily a liturgical text—a set of scripts for enacting events of corporate worship. As such it is at once a standard of theological doctrine and an expression of spirituality. The first part of this survey begins with an examination of one Prayer Book liturgy, known as Divine Service, in some detail. Also discussed are the rites for weddings, ordinations, and funerals and for the sacraments of Baptism and Communion. The second part considers the original version of the Book of Common Prayer in the context of the sixteenth-century Reformation, then as revised and built into the Elizabethan settlement of religion in England. Later chapters discuss the reception, revision, rejection, and restoration of the Prayer Book during its first hundred years. The establishment of the text in its classical form in 1662 was followed by a “golden age” in the eighteenth century, which included the emergence of a modified version in the United States. The narrative concludes with a chapter on the displacement of the Book of Common Prayer as a norm of Anglican identity. Two specialized chapters concentrate on the Prayer Book as a visible artifact and as a text set to music.


1958 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-86
Author(s):  
Geoffrey G. Willis

The preface to the Book of Common Prayer, entitled Concerning the Service of the Church since 1662, but before that simply The Preface, was derived substantially from the preface to the revised Breviary of Quiñones, which was one of the sources for the revised daily offices of the Church of England. It appeals from what it considers the corruptions of the medieval office to the ‘godly and decent order of the ancient Fathers’. This order, it says, was devised for the systematic reading of holy scripture in the offices of the Church, and it was the intention of the compilers of the English Prayer Book to restore such a regular order of reading for the instruction of the people. It represented a revolt against three features of the lessons in the medieval breviary: first, against the frequent interruptions of the reading of scripture in course by the occurrence of feasts with proper lessons; secondly, the lack of completeness and continuity in the lessons themselves; and thirdly, the use of non-biblical material in the lessons. Even if the daily office of the breviary, which is based on the ecclesiastical year, were not interrupted by any immoveable feasts having proper lessons, it would still not provide for the reading of the whole of scripture, as its lessons are too short, and also the variable lessons are confined to the night office.


1920 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 390-401
Author(s):  
Robert Pierce Casey

The Second Report of the Joint Commission on the Book of Common Prayer is an interesting document, not only for the history of liturgy in the American Church but also in showing, perhaps more by implication than by direct statement, the lines along which thought in the Episcopal Church is at present moving.


2016 ◽  
Vol 98 (4) ◽  
pp. 681-701
Author(s):  
Bryan Cones

The 78th General Convention of the Episcopal Church generated a significant number of resolutions related to the church's liturgy, most of which passed both Houses, including resolutions authorizing preparation of the revision of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and The Hymnal 1982. A review of the resolutions related to liturgy and music, however, raises fundamental questions about the kind of liturgical reform the church may undertake and how it may integrate growing appreciation for linguistic and cultural diversity in the church, including the insights of feminist, postcolonial, and LGBTQ theological reflection and those produced by theologians of color. This essay argues that serious engagement with these questions suggests a completely reimagined liturgical “center of gravity” that integrates the insights of liturgical scholarship and practice since the authorization of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and The Hymnal 1982, while providing the flexibility to respond to the church's current diverse contexts.


Gerontologia ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 227-242
Author(s):  
Laura Kalliomaa-Puha

Jokaisella vanhuksella on Suomessa yksilöllinen, viime kädessä perustuslaissa taattu, oikeus riittävään hoivaan ja huolenpitoon. Silti tämä oikeus on usein käytännössä riippuvainen siitä, onko vanhalla ihmisellä omaisia tukenaan. Tässä artikkelissa tarkastellaan sitä, miten oikeus hoivaan ja hoitoon taataan lainsäädännössä. Omaisilla ei lain mukaan ole vastuuta hoivan järjestämisestä, mutta silti lainsäädäntö monessa kohdin ikään kuin olettaa omaisten olevan vanhuksen tukena. Vaikka omaiset usein ovatkin tukena, miten perusoikeus hoivaan ja huolenpitoon toteutuu niillä vanhuksilla, joilla ei ole omaisia? Artikkeli nostaa vakavimpana omaisolettaman riskinä esiin ne vanhukset, joilla on omaisia, mutta joiden omaiset eivät osaa tai halua auttaa. Right to care and presumption of family and friends in the Finnish legislation According to Finnish legislation the public authorities must guarantee adequate social, health and medical services for those old persons who cannot obtain means necessary for a life of dignity. Yet in practice this right to receive indispensable subsistence and care often depends on the fact whether the old person happens to have family or friends to help her or him. As if the legislation supposes there are friends and family to help, even though, according to Finnish law, family members do not have legal responsibility to take care of an elderly person. This article elaborates how the right to care is guaranteed in Finnish legislation and what the law says about the responsibilities of the family. Even though most of the relatives do help their elderlies, how is the right to care fulfilled for those old persons who do not have family? Perhaps the elderlies who have family and friends, which do not help or do not know how to, are in the most vulnerable situation.


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