The Coronation put the Church of England front and centre of national life once again
I have discussed the Coronation with several friends, all devout Monarchists, who found one aspect of the ceremony both surprising and awe-inspiring. I suspect that this was a widespread reaction. Everyone knew that there would be gold coaches, crowns and a magnificent military display. But many people did not realise that the Coronation would also be a profoundly religious service. If Monarchy itself is a secular transcendence, the Archbishop was determined to ensure that he would preside over a Consecration.
He succeeded. These have not been easy years for the Church of England, and Justin Welby himself does not often give the impression that he is enjoying his job. But on Saturday, he placed his Church and its mission back at the centre of the nation’s life. Without going too far into the idiom of management consultancy, the question is whether he can build on that success.
It will not be easy, for the Dear old C. of E. is a deceptive institution. Its current image is a cross between old ladies bicycling to evensong and young men arguing about homosexual marriage. But its history is far more complex, troubled and bloodstained than all that would suggest.
Consider its origins, all connected with Monarchy, sin and strife. England’s religious destiny was shaped in large measure by an Italian battle. In 1525, Charles V defeated the French at Pavia and two years later, his troops seized Rome, making the Pope his prisoner. Shortly afterwards, Henry VIII decided to divorce his Queen, Katherine of Aragon, because she had not produced a male heir. She happened to be Charles V’s aunt.
If Francis I had triumphed at Pavia, it seems unlikely that he would have interested himself in Queen Katherine’s fortunes. But as it was, King Henry could only ensure his divorce by breaking with Rome. That created the momentum for a successful English Reformation.
There were already reformers. But there is no reason to believe that Henry would have sympathised with their theology. Throughout his reign, Protestants were burned as heretics, and Henry himself probably believed that he died as a Catholic – merely one who knew better than the Pope. If he had not forced a breach with Rome, it is unlikely that the English reformers would have prevailed. Indeed, Henry came close to losing his throne in 1536. The Pilgrimage of Grace was an insurrection manned by Catholics who were loyal to Rome and the Papacy. If the Pilgrims had been led by a ruthless and skilful general, they might have won.
Then came a period of top-down religion in which Monarchs played a crucial part. After 1555, in the Treaty of Augsburg, cuius regio eius religio – the ruler decides the religion – became a principle in Germany. Similar arrangements prevailed in England. Edward VI, Henry’s heir, was brought up as a Protestant. Had he not died before he was 16, everything would have been very different. His sister Mary, Katherine of Aragon’s daughter, was a devout Catholic. She had Protestants burned, which did extirpate their faith but led to a public relations disaster. Foxe’s book of Martyrs, which went into gruesome detail about the sufferings of the Marian martyrs, was profoundly successful anti-Roman propaganda. Followed forty years later by the Gunpowder Plot, between them they created a deep suspicion of Rome and all its works, often among many Englishmen who had no other strong religious feelings.
After Mary came Elizabeth I, arguably the first Anglo-Catholic. This outcome would have combined episcopal government and traditional forms of worship with a Protestant view of the eucharist (no transubstantiation) and fewer than the seven Sacraments which Henry VIII had defended. If the Popes could have found a way to avoid excommunicating Elizabeth, some relationship with Rome might have been possible, which could have spared Campion, Southwell and other adornments of their age from a hideous death at Tyburn.
It was not to be. The men of that era took their faith too seriously. After all, if you believe in the literal truth of hell-fire, the sufferings of martyrdom are a trivial price to pay for salvation, while the penalties inflicted on those you regard as heretics are a tiny down-payment on what they are about to receive.
It was a different mental world. But Elizabeth I and her great theologian, Richard Hooker, could both have lived contentedly in a gentler one. As it was, gentleness gradually evolved, a process which was part of the constitutional struggles of the 17th century. By the end, England had a Bible, which must be a powerful argument for the existence of God. The King James Bible was produced by a committee. Anyone who has had dealings with committees must recognise the vast improbability of such a sublime outcome.
The Church also had a prayer-book, drawing heavily on Cranmer’s words. “Dearly beloved”: does that not express a great deal about the English, at least as they would wish to be? Yet Cranmer himself acquiesced in the burning of heretics, and was himself burned at the stake. There is another paradox. “The Beauty of Holiness” is one of the endowments of the Church of England, and a phrase associated with Archbishop Laud. Yet neither word comes to mind when contemplating his life and works. He was beheaded: surely one of the least regrettable of the Civil War’s prominent victims.
By the 18th century, especially once the Jacobites had been seen off and all kings were stolid characters called George, gentleness and tolerance could gradually prevail.
Yet there was a difficulty. Apart from occasional outbreaks of anti-Romanism stimulated by Foxe and Guy Fawkes, religion was becoming civilised – but Anglicanism did not offer some of its potential adherents a sufficiently rigorous diet. It could flourish in the equivalents of Little Gidding, and under pastors such as George Herbert. In a different fashion it could prosper in 18th century Oxbridge, where worship marched closely with preferment, as it did in Trollope’s Barchester – though it is noteworthy that the Warden, a true practitioner of the beauty of holiness, renounced his rich living.
Yet other restless souls believed that shoulders were made for crosses and that a worship based on Christ’s sacrifice must mean more than the easy pieties of the Church reticent. It must be remembered that two of the most outstanding Churchmen whom the C of E has produced, John Wesley and Cardinal Newman, were unable to remain within it. In recent years, the restlessness has grown. It is as if those who have intense religious feelings no longer find a sufficient outlet in “Dearly Beloved.”
So the current Church of England seems both divided and intolerant. There are Anglo-Catholics who would be happy to drop the “Anglo”, matched by Evangelicals who have little use for traditional forms and pieties, and who do not seem to believe in a Church. Meanwhile, the confused layman could well form the impression that Anglican churchmen only want to talk about sex. As for its other doctrines, the days of Anglicans as the Tory party at prayer are long over. It now appears to be more a matter of the Anglican Church wing of the political correctness movement.
Saturday showed what should be: a Church described by Eliot. “History is now and England.” Could that ever be true again? Is there still life in the unique English compromise, as foreshadowed by the first Elizabeth, which offered its adherents a harmony of the best elements of Romans and reformers? Or are we forced to conclude that the Church of England has never and can never escape from its origins, the bloody career of Henry VIII: his sins, its original sin? That version of events has already been given a one-sentence summary by an Irishman, Brendan Behan: “The Church of England was founded on the bollocks of Henry VIII.” He awaits refutation. As it is, we can only hope that in the long, long fullness, there will still be a Church of England able to assert itself as worthy of the name, at least on Coronation Day.
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