scholarly journals Luther’s Legacy: Rethinking the Theology of Lay Discipleship 500 Years after the Reformation

Ecclesiology ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 324-348
Author(s):  
Elaine Graham
Keyword(s):  
Church Of England ◽  
Lay Ministry ◽  
Protestant Reformation ◽  
Missional Ecclesiology ◽  
Church Education ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Everyday World ◽  
The Church

The 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation is significant in many respects, not least in providing an opportunity to revisit Martin Luther’s emphasis on the role of the laity. Yet his legacy of a positive and theologically robust understanding of vocation as located in the everyday world as well as the religious life has only sporadically informed the church’s understanding of lay ministry, and has frequently been frustrated by clericalism and institutional inertia. By revisiting some modern theologies of the laity from the mid-twentieth century, and in dialogue with a recent Church of England report, this article will suggest some ways in which understandings of lay ministry and discipleship might be renewed. A focus on a learning church, education for discernment and a worldly, missional ecclesiology will help to direct the church to a vision of an empowered, confident and theologically literate laity.

Jacob Tengstrom, First Archbishop of Finland

1975 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 336-351
Author(s):  
Toivo Harjunpaa
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Protestant Reformation ◽  
Church Of Sweden ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
The Church

The Reformation of the sixteenth century dealt a heavy blow to the historic episcopal government of the church. Only two of the national churches which embraced the Protestant Reformation succeeded in retaining their old primatical sees and episcopal polity: the Church of England and the Church of Sweden-Finland. For centuries before the Reformation, the Finnish church had been ecclesiastically part of the province of Uppsala (an archbishopric since 1164) just as Finland itself was politically part of the Kingdom of Sweden. Thus there was no need to establish a Finnish archdiocese while union with Sweden continued. But with Napoleon's concurrence (the Tilsit pact of 1807), the Russians invaded Finland in 1808 and met with such success that all Finland was ceded by Sweden to Russia in 1809.

Episcopal Tombs in Early Modern England

2004 ◽  
Vol 55 (4) ◽  
pp. 654-680 ◽  
Author(s):  
PETER SHERLOCK
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
The Status ◽  
The One ◽  
The Church

The Reformation simultaneously transformed the identity and role of bishops in the Church of England, and the function of monuments to the dead. This article considers the extent to which tombs of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century bishops represented a set of episcopal ideals distinct from those conveyed by the monuments of earlier bishops on the one hand and contemporary laity and clergy on the other. It argues that in death bishops were increasingly undifferentiated from other groups such as the gentry in the dress, posture, location and inscriptions of their monuments. As a result of the inherent tension between tradition and reform which surrounded both bishops and tombs, episcopal monuments were unsuccessful as a means of enhancing the status or preserving the memory and teachings of their subjects in the wake of the Reformation.

Clergy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Hill QC
Keyword(s):  
Employment Status ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Church ◽  
And Training

This chapter focuses on the clergy of the Church of England. It first explains the process of selection and training for deacons and priests, along with their ordination, functions, and duties. It then considers the status and responsibilities of incumbents, patronage, and presentation of a cleric to a benefice, and suspension of presentation. It also examines the institution, collation, and induction of a presentee as well as unbeneficed clergy such as assistant curates and priests-in-charge of parishes, the authority of priests to officiate under the Extra-Parochial Ministry Measure, the right of priests to hold office under Common Tenure, and the role of visitations in maintaining the discipline of the Church. The chapter concludes with a discussion of clergy retirement and removal, employment status of clergy, vacation of benefices, group and team ministries, and other church appointments including rural or area deans, archdeacons, diocesan bishops, suffragan bishops, and archbishops.

The Church of England and the Churches of Europe

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tony Claydon
Keyword(s):  
Church Of England ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Protestant Reformation ◽  
The Church

In the period 1662–1829 the Church of England saw itself simultaneously as a national Church for England, as a branch of the European Protestant Reformation, and as a part of a community of Churches across the continent. These identities caused tensions by suggesting different answers to the question of who were true Christians abroad. Anglicans might feel affinities both with Roman Catholic establishments and with the Protestant populations who challenged them. These tensions were managed in part by ambiguity and a determination not to press one identity too hard at the expense of others. This allowed the Church to maintain strong links with a wide variety of the faithful overseas. But tensions were also managed by an increasing spirit of accommodation. Both the Toleration Act of 1689 and the eventual emancipation of Dissenters and Catholics were aided by the struggles of the Church to contain its own internal diversity.

Grace and Nation: Coleridge's On the Constitution of Church and State

2007 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 187-208
Author(s):  
Alan Gregory
Keyword(s):  
Church Of England ◽  
Church And State ◽  
The State ◽  
Christian Church ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Classic Work ◽  
Christ Church ◽  
National Life ◽  
The Church

ABSTRACTUnderstanding Coleridge's classic work On the Constitution of Church and State requires paying close attention to the system of distinctions and relations he sets up between the state, the ‘national church’, and the ‘Christian church’. The intelligibility of these relations depends finally on Coleridge's Trinitarianism, his doctrine of ‘divine ideas’, and the subtle analogy he draws between the Church of England as both an ‘established’ church of the nation and as a Christian church and the distinction and union of divinity and humanity in Christ. Church and State opens up, in these ‘saving’ distinctions and connections, important considerations for the integrity and role of the Christian church within a religiously plural national life.

‘This Romish business’ - Ritual Innovation and Parish Life in Later Nineteenth-Century Lincolnshire

1999 ◽  
Vol 35 ◽  
pp. 384-395
Author(s):  
R. W. Ambler
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
The State ◽  
Local Context ◽  
Holy Communion ◽  
Parish Church ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church ◽  
Mixing Water

In February 1889 Edward King, Bishop of Lincoln, appeared before the court of the Archbishop of Canterbury charged with illegal practices in worship. The immediate occasion for these proceedings was the manner in which he celebrated Holy Communion at the Lincoln parish church of St Peter at Gowts on Sunday 4 December 1887. He was cited on six specific charges: the use of lighted candles on the altar; mixing water with the communion wine; adopting an eastward-facing position with his back to the congregation during the consecration; permitting the Agnus Dei to be sung after the consecration; making the sign of the cross at the absolution and benediction, and taking part in ablution by pouring water and wine into the chalice and paten after communion. Two Sundays later King had repeated some of these acts during a service at Lincoln Cathedral. As well as its intrinsic importance in defining the legality of the acts with which he was charged, the Bishop’s trial raised issues of considerable importance relating to the nature and exercise of authority within the Church of England and its relationship with the state. The acts for which King was tried had a further significance since the ways in which these and other innovations in worship were perceived, as well as the spirit in which they were ventured, also reflected the fundamental shifts which were taking place in the role of the Church of England at parish level in the second half of the nineteenth century. Their study in a local context such as Lincolnshire, part of King’s diocese, provides the opportunity to examine the relationship between changes in worship and developments in parish life in the period.

The Clerical Declaration of Assent

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-187
Author(s):  
Rupert Bursell
Keyword(s):  
Church Of England ◽  
Case Law ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
The Church

Following the Reformation, uniformity was a key principle undergirding worship in the Church of England. The Crown claimed the prerogative to order the use of, and to alter, Church services in spite of the provisions of any Act of Uniformity, the Canons or any Declaration of Assent. This caused confusion among the clergy and others as to who had ‘lawful authority’ to permit such usages or changes. This confusion was exacerbated by episcopal claims to a jus liturgicum. Statute and case law, as well as the wording of the Declaration, also ensured rigidity in doctrinal adhesion. Since the Church of England (Worship and Doctrine) Measure 1974 and recent amendments to the Canons and the Declaration of Assent, this rigidity has been relaxed and clarity provided as to who may authorise services or permit departure from otherwise authorised forms of service.

A Leicestershire Recusant Family: The Nevills of Nevill Holt – I

1984 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernard Elliott
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
James I ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Charles Ii ◽  
Eighteenth And Nineteenth Centuries ◽  
The Church

At the Reformation, three possibilities faced English Catholics. They could continue to be Catholics and so suffer the penalties of the penal laws; they could conform to the Church of England; or they could adopt a middle course and become Church Papists. The Nevills of Nevill Holt, near Market Harborough in Leicestershire, went through all three phases. In the reign of Edward VI, Thomas Nevill I became a Protestant. His grandson, Thomas Nevill II, became a Church Papist under James I; and Thomas II’s son, Henry Nevill I, continued to be one at the time of the Civil War. But Henry l’s son William was definitely a Catholic and went into exile with King James II, while William’s son, Henry Nevill II, was an open Catholic under Charles II. Henry Nevill II’s descendants continued to be Catholics throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries until they left Nevill Holt in the late nineteenth century.

scholarly journals The ethics of absolute relativity: An eschatological ontological model for interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

2014 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Andre Van Oudtshoorn
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction Of Reality ◽  
Sermon On The Mount ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
The World ◽  
Everyday World ◽  
Ontological Model ◽  
In Christ ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Church

Jesus� imperatives in the Sermon on the Mount continue to play a significant role in Christian ethical discussions. The tension between the radical demands of Jesus and the impossibility of living this out within the everyday world has been noted by many scholars. In this article, an eschatological-ontological model, based on the social construction of reality, is developed to show that this dialectic is not necessarily an embarrassment to the church but, instead, belongs to the essence of the church as the recipient of the Spirit of Christ and as called by him to exist now in terms of the coming new age that has already been realised in Christ. The absolute demands of Jesus� imperatives, it is argued, must relativise all other interpretations of reality whilst the world, in turn, relativises Jesus� own definition of what �is� and therefore also the injunctions to his disciples on how to live within this world. This process of radical relativisation provides a critical framework for Christian living. The church must expect, and do, the impossible within this world through her faith in Christ who recreates and redefines reality. The church�s ethical task, it is further argued, is to participate with the Spirit in the construction of signs of this new reality in Christ in this world through her actions marked by faith, hope and love.

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