Anglican Evangelicals: Protestant Secessions from the Via Media, c. 1800 - 1850 - Softcover

Carter, Grayson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 149827837X ISBN 13: 9781498278379

Publisher: Wipf and Stock, 2015

Synopsis

This study examines, within a chronological framework, the major themes and personalities which influenced the outbreak of a number of Evangelical clerical and lay secessions from the Church of England and Ireland during the first half of the nineteenth century. Though the number of secessions was relatively small-between a hundred and two hundred of the 'Gospel clergy' abandoned the Church during this period-their influence was considerable, especially in highlighting in embarrassing fashion the tensions between the evangelical conversionist imperative and the principles of a national religious establishment. Moreover, through much of this period there remained, just beneath the surface, the potential threat of a large Evangelical disruption similar to that which occurred in Scotland in 1843. Consequently, these secessions provoked great consternation within the Church and within Evangelicalism itself, they contributed to the outbreak of millennia! Speculation following the 'constitutional revolution' of 1828-32, they led to the formation of several new denominations, and they sparked off a major Church-State crisis over the legal right of a clergyman to secede and begin a new ministry within Protestant Dissent.

About this title

From the Author:

This study examines the secession of well over a hundred Evangelical clergy (and some laity) from the Church of England during the first half of the nineteenth century, and the various - and often highly contentious - ecclesiological debates that accompanied their departures. It includes an Introduction, nine chapters, an Appendix,a Bibliography, and an Index. While most studies of the English Church in the first half of the nineteenth century make some mention of the well-known Tractarian secessions to Rome, very few seem aware that a similar number of Evangelicals (both clergy and lay) moved in the opposite ecclesiastical direction during the same period (and often for similar reasons), entering into some form of Protestant Dissent. This omission is surprising, for these secessions were of considerable importance to the church. Some Evangelical seceders were members of prominent or wealthy families, such as Baptist W. Noel, Henry Drummond, and George Baring, and thus, from a sociological standpoint, were unlikely converts to Protestant Nonconformity.Others were (or became) highly accomplished theologians and biblical scholars,such as John Nelson Darby. Some were famous preachers, like Edward Irving. Still others were caught up in sensational legal affairs that generated immense - and prolonged - public controversy, such as James Shore, or those who left the church in the aftermath of the celebrated Gorham case. Finally, several Evangelical seceders played a prominent role in Oxford's highly volatile religious life during the 1830s and 1840s. Collectively, the events examined in this study had a significant impact on the English church during at turbulent chapter in its history. The seceders were an unsettling influence on many of their brethren and on the Church of England as a whole.Their role in sharpening up party conflict within the church was significant.The existence of various groups of so-called "ultras" helped to confirm the suspicions of Tory High Churchmen in their stereotyped views about the dangers inherent in extreme Protestantism. To them, the Evangelical seceders provided clear evidence of a tendency toward religious individualism - the belief in "private judgment" taken to an extreme level - which typically led to schism and ecclesiastical anarchy. The seceders were living proof that Evangelicals were unsound in their churchmanship, and had a dangerous proclivity to Dissent. Some seceders, trusting in the imaginary prompting of the Holy Spirit, did in fact illustrate the folly of religious "enthusiasm,"or the consequences of attempting radical biblical exegesis without reliance on the accumulated wisdom of tradition. To their critics, such seceders exhibited in glaring fashion the need for a fixed, objective, dogmatic creed that could not be found in Protestant Dissent. An examination of these seceders and the disputes that accompanied their departures from the church fills in some of the more obscure spaces on the historical canvas. It also illuminates the often opaque (and overlooked) study of Anglican Evangelical ecclesiology. Given the present climate of unrest among Anglican Evangelicals in America, Canada, England, and elsewhere,this study provides a timely reminder of past debates and controversies that bear a striking resemblance to present concerns.

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About this edition

• Publisher: Wipf and Stock
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 149827837X
• ISBN 13: 9781498278379
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 494