Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Foreword
- Author’s Acknowledgements
- 1 The First World War – One Hundred Years On
- 2 Colchester
- 3 Wartime
- 4 The Clergy
- 5 The Laity
- 6 Prayer and Worship
- 7 The National Mission of Repentance and Hope
- 8 Thought and Attitudes
- 9 Armistice, Remembrance and Aftermath
- 10 The Church of England and the First World War
- Bibliography
- Index
6 - Prayer and Worship
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 May 2021
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Foreword
- Author’s Acknowledgements
- 1 The First World War – One Hundred Years On
- 2 Colchester
- 3 Wartime
- 4 The Clergy
- 5 The Laity
- 6 Prayer and Worship
- 7 The National Mission of Repentance and Hope
- 8 Thought and Attitudes
- 9 Armistice, Remembrance and Aftermath
- 10 The Church of England and the First World War
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The Church of England can sometimes appear a very complicated and indeed contradictory organisation. Since the Elizabethan Settlement in the sixteenth century, the Church has aspired to be the Church of the English nation, providing a broad religious home for English men and women of a variety of theological outlooks and spiritualities. The Church of England has long contained different churchmanships, and at times it feels like at least three Churches rolled into one. This has been aided by a certain studied ambiguity: the Communion rite in the Book of Common Prayer after 1559, to take one example, was patent of several different interpretations.
The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries saw the Evangelical Revival amongst evangelicals in the Church of England and Nonconformist churches. This deepened the spiritual vision and commitment of individual evangelicals, renewed the life of some churches, led to greater expectations amongst the clergy and inspired missions at home and overseas. It was emphatically Protestant in character.
Renewal of a quite different sort began in 1833 with the Oxford Movement and subsequent Catholic Revival. This startled many in the Church of England by claiming that their Church was not Protestant, as many had long believed, but that its formularies might be interpreted to show that it was a part of Catholic Christendom. The Catholic Revival led to a renewal of liturgical worship and sacramental spirituality amongst its followers, and to the revival of the religious life. One result of the Catholic Revival, however, was an increase in conflict as Protestantminded members of the Church of England came to believe that their Reformation identity was being undermined and erroneous doctrines were being reintroduced by Anglo-Catholics.
The Church of England in 1914–18 might perhaps be pictured as a dynamic and moving triangle, with Anglo-Catholics, evangelicals and liberals in the three corners, and the various intermediate churchmanships – what were usually known as ‘middle-of-the road’ or ‘central’ – ranged along the three sides of the triangle. Each corner of the Anglican triangle tugged in a different direction and tussled for the identity of the Church of England. The Anglo-Catholics stressed the Church of England's Catholic heritage, and sought to enrich their worship in a more Catholic and sometimes Roman direction.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Church of England and the Home Front, 1914-1918Civilians, Soldiers and Religion in Wartime Colchester, pp. 123 - 160Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2015