Difference between revisions of "Church of England"

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The Church of England (or, Anglican Church) is the English national church that traces its history back to the sixth century in England. Under King Henry VIII it broke with Rome and formed a denomination that became part of the Protestant Reformation. It contains High Church elements (similar to the Roman Catholics), Low Church elements (similar to evangelicals), and a Broad Church middle. It is part of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

Canterbury Cathedral is the mother church of the Church of England

Establishment

Chester Cathedral

The church was formally organised by King Henry VIII of England. Like Oriental and Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches (and unlike Protestant churches), Anglicans maintain authority within the church through Apostolic succession.

Religion

Henry VIII, who reigned 1509-47, broke with the Pope on two issues, his divorce, and control over the Church inside England, as he declared himself head of the Church in England. Disagreement with Henry on religious issues was a political affront, and he could not tolerate it. Moderate reform took place in the 1530s because Queen Anne and top aides Thomas Cranmer and Cromwell had the king's ear and carried out attacks on the old religion. Queen Anne patronized and promoted clergy and bishops of a reforming turn of mind; Cromwell (1485?–1540), the Earl of Essex, was a convinced reformer and in effect the ruthless and unpopular prime minister from 1532 until he fell from favour and was beheaded in 1540. Cranmer (1489–1556) was archbishop of Canterbury after 1533. Henry persecuted of those who still held to Papal Supremacy, and encouraged Protestant ideas to flourish. Protestantism was officially established during the short reign of Henry’s son, Edward VI.

After Henry's death in 1547 Cranmer wrote much of the first Book of Common Prayer (1549, revised 1552), the centerpiece of the Anglican liturgy. The basic summary of Anglican beliefs and practices is the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion, written by Thomas Cranmer and adopted in 1563 under Queen Elizabeth I. This marks the full establishment of the Church of England, largely Protestant in theology but with a hierarchical structure similar to the old Roman Catholic establishment, and a largely Catholic liturgy translated from Latin into English. Numerous dissenters had theological differences, a major factor leading to the English Civil War of the 17th century.

Leadership

The British monarch (currently, Queen Elizabeth II) is titular head of the church.

The Archbishop of Canterbury is the Primate of the church.

The principal book of worship in Anglican churches is the Book of Common Prayer. Most churches in England still follow the liturgy set down in it, despite moves to modernize the language - all of which were rejected by the Bishops. The Church of England is referred to as the "established church" of England. At the time of the American Revolution, it was a legal requirement in England that all public officials, including university professors, take an oath to uphold the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England. There were no such requirements in the colonies, but the Church of England was established and tax supported in the five southern colonies. They were disestablished during the Revolution.^[1]

Components

The worldwide body, the Anglican Communion, is an association of those churches in full communion with the Church of England (which may be regarded as the "mother church" of the worldwide communion), and specifically with its primate, the Archbishop of Canterbury. These include:

• Church of England
• Anglican Church in Australia
• Anglican Church of Canada
• Anglican Church of Southern Africa
• Anglican Church in Wales
• Anglican Episcopal Church of Japan‎
• Episcopal Church in the United States of America
• Extra-provincial Anglican churches
• Scottish Episcopal Church
• Sheng Kung Hui

Continuing Anglicanism is a movement of churches whose beliefs and practices are Anglican, but are not in full communion with the Church of England. These churches are generally more conservative.

Trivia

In the late 1800s, there was a movement to disestablish the Church of England. It failed, but it had the incidental effect of giving the English language one of its longest words, "antidisestablishmentarianism".

Bibliography

• Chapman, Mark. Anglicanism: A Very Short Introduction (2006) excerpt and text search
• Hassett, Miranda K. Anglican Communion in Crisis: How Episcopal Dissidents and Their African Allies Are Reshaping Anglicanism (2007) excerpt and text search
• Pawley, Bernard & Margaret Pawley. Rome and Canterbury Through Four Centuries four centuries: A study of the relations between the church of Rome and the Anglican churches 1530-1973 (1974)
• Porter, Muriel. The New Puritans: The Rise of Fundamentalism in the Anglican Church (2007)
• Rosenthal, James. The Essential Guide to the Anglican Communion (1998)
• Sykes, Stephen, and John Booty, eds. The Study of Anglicanism (1988), important essays by 31 scholars on all aspects of the Church

Primary sources

• Evans, G.R. and Robert Wright, eds. The Anglican Tradition: A Handbook of Sources (1991), over 600 historical documents

External links

• Anglicana Ecclesia, primary documents

References