Between the Book of Common Prayer and R.S. Thomas:
Selected authors and changes in the
expressed understandings of God
Introduction
Elements that gave shape to a
changing distinctively Anglican tradition of the expressed understanding of
God, as evident with reference to representative figures in this study, include
the advantages of learning enjoyed by many of them, as well as their literary
inclinations, spirituality expressive of Anglo-Saxon and Celtic culture,
considerable intellectual ability and in some cases its popular articulation.[1]
The secret of this astonishing
vitality in what would seem at first glance to be no more than the island
religion of a handful of erudite people practising an aristocratic piety, lay
in the succession of admirable personalities … and in the quality of their
Christian culture.[2]
It may plausibly be argued that
the ethos and pattern of Anglicanism was set in motion from the beginning of
the period under review, by people who match Bouyer’s description. The formative influences that have prevailed
through and even in spite of the aspirations and machinations of various
streams and parties of the following centuries, have done so essentially
because they captured and articulated a more enduring English spirit, enabling
a contradictory church to variously survive, flourish and develop. This is well expressed by Ronald Knox of the
post-Reformation church, though in the context of his own changed
ecclesiastical allegiance nearly four hundred years later.
More and Cranmer did not die for
the sake of two separate churches respectively, but for the sake of this single
spiritual connection – each of them for his idea of what it ought to be. The Reformation did not unchurch the Church;
it merely put the Church into a state of Babylonish captivity under the
Crown. In order to keep the peace, Queen
Elizabeth and her advisers botched together a series of provisional formulas –
doctrinal and liturgical – midway between the two parties in tendency.[3]
The devising of doctrinal
formulas to keep the peace set the characteristic tone of Anglicanism’s
theological tensions down to the present time.
The fact of the expressed understanding of God changing between the time
of the Book of Common Prayer and R.S.
Thomas, is therefore a more inevitable question than for the confessing
churches of the continental Reformation, or for the magisterium-based doctrinal
system of Roman Catholicism.
An important aspect in
comprehending changes in the expressed understanding of God, as seen through
works of the chosen authors of this study between the Book of Common Prayer and R.S. Thomas, includes an awareness of the
various influences which shaped and modified that understanding. These influences themselves varied and developed;
from the politically and doctrinally motivated evolution of successive editions
of the prayer book, through the impact of the English literary tradition
itself, the Catholic quest of the Oxford Movement, to the belief and ecclesial
issues of the twentieth century, and through changing social contexts.
Foundations
On a generous view of
Anglicanism, in which unity was imperceptibly located in an intangible English
spirit rather than in an agreed ecclesiology, the Book of Common Prayer was central to a pragmatic unity. The strength of the prayer book in this
respect does not neutralize its perceived doctrinal and liturgical limitations.
… the Liturgy, broadly speaking,
was plainly based on Catholic lines. Its
presentation, however, was added to here, or whittled away there, in a manner
unmistakably Protestant. The most
perplexed of all its sections was that of the Eucharist. A succession of inchoate but uncompleted
rearrangements had made it very difficult to form any clear idea of what its
final revisers really intended.[4]
The expressed understanding of
God in relation to the prayer book may be understood both in relation to the
contents of the book, and as seen in the manner of its use over several
centuries. The thesis that the Book of Common Prayer provides a
foundation for a “comprehensive system” of religious life is cogently argued on
the basis of its integral provision for a daily Office, the Eucharist and
personal devotion.[5] That has remained a significant strand in the
Anglican approach to worship, with an acknowledgement that the prayer book is
“far more than a collection of rites … [and is] a living expression of the
profound union between what we believe and what we pray”.[6]
Illustrative of that principled
view, the homely experience of George Herbert is an example of liturgy shaped
to domestic expression.
Mr Herbert’s own practice … was …
to appear constantly with his wife and … his whole family twice every day at
the Church prayers, in the chapel which does almost join to his Parsonage House. And for the time of his appearing, it was
strictly at the Canonical Hours of 10 and 4 …
… … …
And his constant public prayers
did never make him to neglect his own private devotions, nor those prayers that
he thought himself bound to perform with his family, which always were a
set-form, and not long. And he did
always conclude them with that Collect which the Church hath appointed for the
day or week.[7]
Even through less devout eras
when the Church experienced neglect of its liturgy as a comprehensive system,
as in the period prior to the Oxford Movement, the Book of Common Prayer was still sufficiently deeply rooted in the
English temperament to sustain whatever would become of Anglicanism in the
reaction of the Catholic revival.
Indeed, it may be surmised that the unarticulated patriotism evoked by
the prayer book was such that subsequent Anglo-Catholic doctrinal positions and
liturgical reforms were perceived by their opponents as being imported from
continental Catholicism, and therefore disloyal to the spirit of the Book of Common Prayer. This had serious implications for a
mainstream English understanding of God, mindful of historic fears of Catholic
domination.
The place of the Articles of
Religion must also be taken into account.
Protestant in character, the present attitude toward the Articles is
well summarised:
[T]he Articles ought to be read
in the light of the situation out of which they came, and to which they were
addressed, and … their words must be taken in the context and the sense they
bore at the time of writing, and their statements construed in the light of the
known views, assumptions and intentions of their authors.[8]
The significance of the Articles
in considering the understanding of God from the time of the Book of Common Prayer, is that they
encapsulate the enduring Anglican tension between Catholic and Protestant
approaches. Their binding in a single
volume with the prayer book undoubtedly contributed to their continued
prominence, even to the point of “endow[ing] them with an authority which is
sometimes scarcely distinguishable from infallibility”.[9] Never-the-less, the view that “they were so
drawn up that anyone who still had any sort of leaning towards catholic
tradition, could, at a pinch, manage to get along with them” is a fair
assessment of the pragmatic reality.[10]
It can be seen, then, that the
place of the Book of Common Prayer in
considering this question of changes in the expressed understanding of God, is
itself both constant and malleable through successive eras.
Divines and Poets
The work and influence of Hooker,
Donne, the Caroline Divines, Andrewes, Cosin, Herbert, Ferrar, Vaughan,
Traherne and others, provided a sound structure of theology and piety to match
the foundational spirituality of the Book
of Common Prayer. Continuity with
the direction set by the ethos of the prayer book, grounded in English language
and culture, struck a durable social chord and became well established.
If Hooker was the religious
thinker who first conceived what we call Anglicanism, Andrewes may be viewed as
the first pastor who tried with some success to get it adopted by the English
Church, mainly because he lived it with such rare intensity.[11]
Lancelot Andrewes’ prayers convey
an understanding of God that is simultaneously sublime as well as being
thoroughly grounded in earthly realities.
They are comprehensive in every respect.[12] The structure of Andrewes’ daily and weekly
forms of prayer portray one whose spirituality was profoundly immersed in the
doctrinal, ecclesial and social aspects of his life. The scope of his intercession subjects and
the biblically-rooted thanksgivings and deprecations, convey an understanding
of God which was inextricably linked to every condition of human life and its
relationship with the divine. The
exquisite crafting of Andrewes’ language itself bears witness to the importance
of beauty in Anglicanism, as a vehicle for communicating something of the
divine.
The contrasting figures, Lancelot
Andrewes and John Cosin, are referred to as “[t]wo of the greatest bishops of
the seventeenth century”.[13] Both Andrewes’ and Cosin’s great gift to the
Church is in their prayers. In Cosin’s
case, he extended the liturgical tradition beyond the limits of the Book of Common Prayer. His tolerance of departure from the
liturgical inheritance was limited.[14] In his analysis of this, Martin Thornton is
on doubtful ground in making unsubstantiated parenthetic comment on
twentieth-century liturgical trends and experiment, by way of retrospective
comparisons of the attitudes of the past.[15] The time that has passed since Thornton’s
words demonstrates that the Book of
Common Prayer in its various provincial revisions has reached relatively
definitive forms through the very process of “experimental use” to which he
fleetingly alluded under cover of Cosin’s supposed viewpoint.
Formed in the Ignatian tradition,
it is impossible to make any assessment of the poet John Donne as a priest
without taking into account the Roman Catholicism of his mother’s family, and
of his own upbringing. Given his
background, he was, in a sense, ideally placed as an apologist for the Church of
England against the Church of Rome, as evidenced by Pseudo-Martyr and Ignatius
his Conclave, written in 1610 and 1611, before his ordination in 1615.[16]
At the same time, Catholicism’s
influence remained with Donne. Bouyer
comments on its relocation within Anglicanism.
Not only did this renegade from
Catholicism reaccommodate all the emotional side of medieval piety within
Anglicanism, but – more and more and right to the end – he galvanized his faith
by a systematic discipline of the life of the senses worn out by attrition
against will and conscience. It was like
a holocaust of the senses in which they themselves ignited the fire that would
consume them.[17]
These rather dramatic comments
may be placed alongside Booty’s eloquent summary of Donne’s spiritual life.
His spiritual journey can be
likened to an ascent in which there is a gradual conversion of objects. For the early Donne the fire of love was
directed toward some earthly object, sometimes in the light of the divine; for
the later Donne the fire of love burned for God, understood, often perceived in
relation to earthly phenomena.[18]
These concise words incisively
convey a full sense of Donne’s humanity and his conversion. His life experience in tandem with his poetry
and priesthood, richly convey the lived experience of one who grappled with the
implications of the incarnational principle which has come to characterise the
Anglican expression of Christian faith.
In his poetry, the arresting “Batter my heart” (whose tone, content and
theology are so well captured by Booty[19])
wonderfully and expressively conveys Donne, alive, passionate and devout.
By contrast Thomas Traherne in
his Centuries, more even-temperedly
presents a vision of human happiness finding its fulfilment in God’s love. Traherne presents God as the one in whom
rests the ultimate union of all creation and humanity, expressed by him thus:
The fellowship of the mystery
that hath been hid in God since the creation is not only the contemplation of
His Love in the work of redemption, tho’ that is wonderful, but the end for
which we are redeemed; a communion with Him in all His Glory.[20]
The Oxford Movement
John Keble’s 1833 Assize Sermon
and The Tracts for the Times set in
motion a movement which in its several phases, was to have a profound effect on
Anglicanism. The Tractarians, as John
Henry Newman, John Keble, Edward Bouverie Pusey and their followers came to be
known, were followed by a second generation of Anglo-Catholics. The Catholic revival gained momentum, with
various groupings and emphases encompassing a broad spectrum, ranging from the
Percy Dearmer and the Cambridge ecclesiologists focusing on a more specifically
English expression of Catholicism, to Lord Halifax and members of the Church
Union, including Anglo-Papalists whose fervent prayer was for corporate reunion
with Rome. Theologically and in relation
to the religious life, Charles Gore is representative of a more mainstream
Catholicism.
Central to Tractarian concerns
were the Catholicity of the Church, a faithful continuity with the Early Church
Fathers, and freedom from State interference in episcopal authority. Identification of the widespread effects of
the Oxford Movement for well over a century, usefully conveys a sense of its
implications for the expressed understanding of God. The impact of the Oxford Movement was
eventually to be felt in almost every province of the Church, even by way of
reaction among those who resisted its influence. The Movement had consequences for
developments in liturgy, including its architecture and music; in theology and
biblical scholarship; in theological training and pastoral practice; and in
monastic and spiritual revival.
Renewed interest in the spiritual
life of Anglicans saw the publication of liturgical texts, devotional and instructional
manuals, and attention given to methods of meditation and ascetical systems.[21] At an extreme end of the High Church
spectrum, uncritical and sometimes wholesale adoption of the theology, piety
and customs of continental Catholicism was a significant feature of the
Catholic revival, even to the point of openly despising identifiably Anglican
ways. It is fair to say that the
sometimes overly precious nature of Anglo-Catholicism has led to less
acceptance of Catholicism than may have been the case had it been given a more
recognisably English expression. Never-the-less,
the Catholic spirit has pervaded the mainstream of Anglican life, even among
those who would not (or would not wish to) specifically identify themselves as
High Church or Anglo-Catholic.
Anglican and Catholic
For John Henry Newman, the Oxford
Movement eventually resulted in his 1845 reception into the Roman Catholic
Church. This was a serious loss for
those who had looked to him for leadership, particularly in view of his former
defence of the Anglican Church as the Via
Media; a middle course between Roman Catholicism and Protestant extremes.[22] Conversely, Newman’s change of religious
allegiance, and that of other prominent Anglicans who followed him, was a gain
for Roman Catholicism. From an Anglican
perspective, this was undoubtedly accompanied by a sense of loss and
interpreted by some as desertion of the Catholic cause in Anglicanism.
The expressed understanding of
God in this respect therefore, inevitably to some extent, did not alleviate a
perhaps unacknowledged but lingering English suspicion of Catholicism as
foreign, and that by implication, Anglo-Catholics “just might go over to Rome”!
Gerard Manley Hopkins was
received from Anglicanism into the Roman Catholic Church by Newman. It may seem ironical to observe that like
Newman and others who have “crossed the Tiber”, Hopkins’ Catholicism was formed
and nurtured within Anglicanism.
Whatever deficiencies or difficulties may subsequently come to be
associated with remaining an Anglican, the truth of Catholicism may
legitimately be seen to form part of the expressed understanding of God of
these figures.
It is difficult not to think
affectionately of Ronald Knox. His
enlightening Spiritual Aeneid shows
integrity in his inner struggle to remain an Anglican and his eventual
conviction that he must become a Roman Catholic. An enduring gift to Anglicanism worthy of
greater dissemination, lies in his still recognisable insight into the
differences in religious experience and perception resulting from Catholic and
Anglican religious education.[23]
This same thorough-going
characteristic of analysis is evident supremely in his realisation that while
it was possible to “invoke the saints as a matter of course, to use the rosary,
to adore the sacrament in the Tabernacle”[24]
as an Anglican, authentic Catholic spirituality is not based on such
preferences, but on the pivotal matter of the authority of the Church.
The Twentieth Century from Evelyn Underhill
The representative authors of
this study from the time of Evelyn Underhill onwards are closer to our own
time. Their place in the changing
understanding of God in Anglican history may therefore be assessed from within
a more direct awareness of the context of belief, the social regard for religion
and the spiritual climate emerging after the 1939-45 World War II years.
Evelyn Underhill’s remarkable
contribution to an expressed Anglican understanding of God, is in the
reawakening of the mystical dimension and making it accessible through her
pioneering work. She is therefore an
important foundational writer in the contemporary resurgence of interest in the
spiritual tradition.[25] Underhill’s awareness and grasp of the
tradition is immense. For instance, a
glance at the bibliography of Mysticism
reveals an enormous breadth and depth that contributed to her scholarship. Yet true worth is perceptively and engagingly
seen in her correspondence with those who sought her spiritual guidance.[26] Evelyn Underhill’s enduring appeal is in part
undoubtedly due to her ability to grasp and translate the spiritual tradition
in a way that transcends the besetting Anglo-Catholic fault of a slavish
imitation of Roman Catholic practices.
These comments should not be construed as being critical of Roman
Catholicism. Rather, they are directed
to the inevitable limitation of uniquely Anglican insight, resulting from a
failure to fully explore the tradition with a healthy respect for and awareness
of Anglican perspectives.
In describing his journey to
faith, C.S. Lewis refers to what he calls the “Argument from Undesign”
It is not strange that I should
feel the universe to be a menacing and unfriendly place. Several years before I read Lucretius I felt
the force of his argument (and it is surely the strongest of all) for atheism –
…
Had God designed the world it
would not be
A world so frail and faulty as we
see.[27]
This comment from Lewis’ mature
reflection on his journey to faith is illustrative of his intellectual struggle
to reach Christian faith. Rather than a
journey into belief, Lewis’ journey might more accurately be described as being
successively away from atheism and from his temporary staging-post of theism,
into Christian belief. Given his
preoccupation with recounting this journey, his disclosure concerning his
acceptance of the Eucharist conveys a sense of freedom that faith eventually
allowed him. “I hope I do not offend God
by making my communions in the frame of mind I have been describing. The command, after all, was Take, eat: not
Take, understand.”[28]
C.S. Lewis’ contribution to the
expressed understanding of God in the modern era should not be
underestimated. His religious works are
still widely read, indicating their continuing ability to connect with the
articulation of contemporary struggles concerning belief. The credibility of Lewis as someone who
arrives at a point of belief through the path of unbelief, clearly continues to
resonate with many.
As with the importance of C.S.
Lewis’ broadcast talks in making religious thought and dialogue commonly
accessible, so too Dorothy Sayers’ plays, both on stage and radio fulfilled the
same role. Both figures are examples of,
and point to the importance of what has now become commonplace and highly
sophisticated, in the use of mass media communications.
Twentieth Century Transition
In the time that has passed since
Michael Ramsey was consecrated bishop and in the years since he was archbishop
of Canterbury, the Communion over which he presided, the Christian Church in
general, and the cultural contexts of religion have undergone enormous
changes. Fundamental differences between
liberal and conservative groupings in Christianity have produced potentially
irreconcilable tensions. Meanwhile
within Anglicanism itself, the once clearly recognisable parties have become
correspondingly realigned across denominational boundaries.
Michael Ramsey’s broadly
acceptable Catholic spirit, considerable intellectual ability, sensitively
persistent ecumenical endeavours, and pastoral concern, were characteristics of
the last archbishop to occupy the See of Canterbury before the disintegration
of the relative certainties of Anglicanism gained greater momentum. The scholar who authored The Gospel and the Catholic Church and The Resurrection of Christ, and the pastor whose The Christian Priest Today inspired and
guided many priests, embodied the humility, care and integrity of God. Michael Ramsey’s ministry as archbishop is
still recent enough for visual images of his meeting with Pope Paul VI to
remain imprinted on the mind.
At the end of the reading of the
Common Declaration, the Pope and the Archbishop embraced, exchanging the
parchments just signed. … The two were about to depart when there occurred an
episode which L’Osservatore Romano
thus described: ‘At the door of the basilica, before descending, the Supreme
Pontiff did something that was unforeseen and of the highest significance [di altissimo significato]: he took his
ring off his finger and placed it himself on the finger of His Grace Archbishop
Ramsey. …’[29]
As in his scholarly and pastoral
endeavours, Michael Ramsey’s diligent ecumenical labours ensure his place in
affectionate memory. He is perhaps above
all remembered as a man of great holiness, particularly by those who knew him
personally and as a bishop.[30]
Poets
Examination of how T.S. Eliot’s
ideas about literary tradition transpose themselves into ideas pertaining to
English spiritual tradition has been undertaken.[31] This question offers an important insight
into how the expressed understanding of God might be approached in the context
of post-modernism’s absence of an agreed metaphysic. At the very real risk of naively overly
simplifying and reducing a complex debate, the expressed understanding of God
discernable in Eliot’s articulation of tradition, may at least offer indicators
concerning the tradition’s ability to explore the present in continuity with
the past. In this connection, the power
of poetry’s forms to deeply engage with the intellect and with the human
spirit, is itself an alluring invitation.
Eliot’s sense of continuity is enchantingly expressed in the
often-quoted Little Gidding lines:
We shall not cease from
exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we
started
And know the place for the first
time.[32]
Eliot stands within a strong
Anglican intellectual and literary tradition; his own continuity in it assured
by his consciousness of
the sense of the past which makes
us truly aware of the present, conscious of our own place in time, at least
when the past is known as involving the timeless as well as the temporal, and
is known as being in some way contemporary with us.[33]
Current interest in spirituality
may yet see a reawakening of awareness of the Western mystical tradition. Eliot’s poetry provides a valuable link with
this religious dimension, and in continuity of his own ability to draw widely
from the tradition, his works offer the foundations of an invitation for such
an exploration. Paul Murray’s
introduction indicates the possibilities.
Perhaps the most obvious indication
of a mystical dimension in Four Quartets
is that fact that, although only a very small number of direct quotations are
incorporated into the poem, almost all of them are taken by Eliot from mystical
sources, from St John of the Cross, for example, and The Bhagavad-Gita, from Julian of Norwich and from The Cloud of Unknowing. … But the
mystical dimension of Eliot’s poem extends far beyond these few explicit
quotations. It is as much present, for
example, in the poem’s music as it is in its underlying mystical philosophy.[34]
The selection of R.S. Thomas as
the final representative figure in this study is significant in that although
he belonged to the British Isles, he was assuredly not English. Thomas’ Welsh identity and his life and ministry
in a harsh rural environment, present a dimension requiring the attention of
neighbouring English Anglicanism. From
within his culture, Thomas is an implicit reminder of issues of marginalized
minorities and nationalist aspirations in cultures which now comprise the bulk
of Anglican population. The significance
of Thomas’ life and ministry occurring within the ‘death of God’ era and as
secularism encroached, inevitably emerges in the expressed understanding of God
in his poetry.
The current Celtic revival,
including the rediscovery of its spirituality, offers the Church a way to
engage with cultural diversity.[35] Honouring the integrity of the culture and
avoiding commercialised romanticism is important for non-exploitative learning
and dialogue.[36] The far less familiar African and Asian
cultures are set to have a greater impact on the future of the Anglican
Communion than can yet be imagined.
Conclusion
How the expressed understanding
of God in Anglicanism continues to change from this current point in history
remains to be seen. Speculation as to
who may ultimately be identified as enduring formative influences from the
latter part of the twentieth century may still be somewhat premature. Additional noteworthy theological and
spiritual contributions have come from various perspectives, including those of
J.A.T. Robinson, Eric Mascall, Alan Ecclestone, John Macquarrie and Kenneth
Leech. While particular figures may
stand out for a time or more enduringly, Anglicanism is primarily a way of being Christian, rather than
being built on any particular personality.
Two further themes also present
unknown territory to be negotiated: those of profound theological and social
differences emerging within the Communion, as between the Church generally; and
the uncertainties of the post-modern world and of whatever may be implications
for the Church in this context.
Through the complexities of
contemporary Anglicanism’s streams, cultures and tensions, it is possible to
confidently identify Rowan Williams, successively archbishop of Wales then of
Canterbury, as a sign of hope enduring into the long term. A sample of his writings may well serve as a
post-script to this study, demonstrating his clear ability to grasp and analyse
the tradition, an attractive engagement with the need for spiritual
connectedness of devotion, an expansively articulate theological grasp,
biblical integrity, and an awareness of the importance of the spiritual
tradition.[37]
Bibliography
Allchin,
A.M. “Anglicanism” In The Study of
Spirituality, ed. Cheslyn Jones, et al. London: SPCK, 1986
Andrewes,
Lancelot. Private Devotions. trans.
J.H. Newman and J.M. Neale. London: H.R. Allenson, n.d.
Bennett,
J.A.W. Poetry of the Passion. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1982
Book of Common Prayer. London:
Oxford University Press
Booty, John,
ed. John Donne. CWS Series. New York:
Paulist Press, 1990
Bouyer,
Louis. A History of Christian
Spirituality III: Orthodox Spirituality and Protestant and Anglican
Spirituality. London: Burns and Oates, 1969
Brame, Grace
A. “Evelyn Underhill and the Mastery of Time” in Spirituality Today (vol.42 no.4 Winter 1990) 341-356
Cropper, Margaret.
Evelyn Underhill. London: Longmans,
Green and Co., 1958
Durkin, Mary
Brian. “Teresian Wisdom in Evelyn Underhill” in Spiritual Life (vol.41 no.1 Spring 1995) 20-31
de Waal,
Esther. A Life-Giving Way. London:
Geoffrey Chapman, 1995
Eliot, T.S. Collected Plays. London: Faber and
Faber, 1962
The English Catholic Prayer Book. London:
Faith press, n.d.
The English Missal. London: W.
Knott & Son, 1933
Faber,
Geoffrey. Oxford Apostles. London:
Faber and Faber, 1974
The First and Second Prayer Books
of Edward VI. London: J.M. Dent and Sons, 1949
Ford, Boris,
ed., The New Pelican Guide to English
Literature, vol.8 The Present.
Penguin, 1983
Gardner,
W.H. and N.H. MacKenzie. The Poems of
Gerard Manley Hopkins. fourth edn. London: Oxford University Press, 1970
Guiver,
George. Company of Voices. New York:
Pueblo Publishing Company, 1988
Hale,
Robert. Canterbury and Rome: Sister
Churches. London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1982
Hayward,
John, ed., John Donne. Hammondsworth:
Penguin Books, 1950, reprinted 1969
The Hours of Prayer. London:
A.R. Mowbray, 1910
Johnson,
Todd E. “Pneumatological Oblation: Evelyn Underhill’s Theology of the
Eucharist” in Worship 68 (July 1994)
313-332
Jones,
Cheslyn, et al. ed., The Study of
Spirituality. London: SPCK, 1986
King, Margot
H. ed. The 1990 Calendar of Holy Women.
Toronto: Peregrina Publishing Co., 1989
Knox,
Ronald. A Spiritual Aeneid. new
edition. London: Burns Oates, 1958
Lewis, C.S. Letters to Malcolm. London: Collins
Fontana Books, 1966
Livingston,
James C. Modern Christian Thought.
New York: The Macmillan Company, 1971
McGrade,
A.S. “Reason” In The Study of Anglicanism,
ed. Stephen Sykes and John Booty. London: SPCK, 1988
More, P.E.
and F.L. Cross. Anglicanism. London:
SPCK, 1935
Moorman,
John R., The Anglican Spiritual Tradition.
London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1983
Murray,
Paul. T.S. Eliot and Mysticism.
London: Macmillan, 1971
Newman, J.
H. Autobiographical Writings, ed.
Henry Tristram. London: Sheed and Ward, 1956
Platten,
Stephen. Augustine’s Legacy. London:
Darton, Longman and Todd, 1997
Practical Instruction in the
Faith. London:
Church Literature Association, 1935
Ramsey, A. M.
The Christian Priest Today. London:
SPCK, 1972
Rosenthal,
Peggy. “Poet of the hidden God (poet R.S. Thomas)” in Christian Century (Jan.17 2001) http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m10582_118/70451337/print.jhtml
Scott,
David. Sacred Tongues: The Golden Age of
Spiritual Writing. London: SPCK, d.u.
Sheldrake,
Philip. Befriending our Desires.
London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2001
Staley,
Vernon. The Catholic Religion.
London: A.R. Mowbray, 1912
Stranks,
C.J. “Centuries of Meditations” in Anglican
Devotion. London: SCM Press, 1961
Sykes,
Stephen W. The Integrity of Anglicanism.
London: Mowbrays, 1978
Sykes,
Stephen and John Booty, ed. The Study of
Anglicanism. London: SPCK, 1988
Thomas, R.S.
Everyman’s Poetry. London: Dent, 2001
Thornton, Martin.
English Spirituality. London: SPCK,
1963. reprinted, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cowley Publications, 1986
Timmerman,
John H. “Lancelot Andrews and T.S. Eliot: the making of histories” in American Benedictine Review 44:1 (March
1993) 76-98
Traherne,
Thomas. Centuries. London: A R
Mowbray, 1975
Underhill,
Evelyn. Eucharistic Prayers from the
Ancient Liturgies. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1939, reprinted 1955
Walker,
David. Evelyn Underhill. Sydney:
Centre for Christian Spirituality, 2003
Waugh,
Evelyn. The Life of Ronald Knox.
Chapman and Hall, 1959
Williams,
Charles, ed. The Letters of Evelyn
Underhill. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1943
Williams,
Rowan. On Christian Theology. Oxford:
Blackwell, 2000
Wolf, W.J.
“The Spirituality of Thomas Traherne” in Anglican
Spirituality. Wilton Connecticut: Morehouse-Barlow, 1982
[1] Louis Bouyer, Orthodox Spirituality and Protestant and Anglican Spirituality.
(London: Burns and Oates, 1969) 108
[2] Bouyer, Orthodox
Spirituality and Protestant and Anglican Spirituality. 109
[5] Martin Thornton, English Spirituality (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cowley
Publications, 1986), 262
[6] Louis Weil, “The Gospel in Anglicanism” in The Study of Anglicanism, ed. Stephen
Sykes and John Booty (London: SPCK, 1988), 63
[7] P.E. More and F.L. Cross, ed. Anglicanism (London: SPCK, 1935),
734-735
[8] Subscription
and Assent to the 39 Articles (London: 1968), 13. quoted in Stephen Sykes
and John Booty, ed. The Study of
Anglicanism (London: SPCK, 1988), 137
[9] John R. Moorman, The Anglican Spiritual Tradition (London: Darton, Longman and Todd,
1983), 58
[10] Bouyer, Newman
His Life and Spirituality, 159
[11] Bouyer, Orthodox
Spirituality and Protestant and Anglican Spirituality, 117
[12] Lancelot Andrewes, Private Devotions trans. J.H. Newman and J.M. Neale (London: H.R.
Allenson, n.d.)
[13] A.M. Allchin, The Kingdom of Love and Knowledge (London: Darton, Longman and Todd,
1979), 119
[17] Bouyer, Orthodox
Spirituality and Protestant and Anglican Spirituality, 114
[20] Thomas Traherne, Centuries (London: A.R. Mowbray, 1975), 1.5
Vernon Staley, The Catholic
Religion first published 1893 (London: A.R. Mowbray, 1912)
Practical Instruction
in the Faith (London: Church literature Association, 1935)
The Hours of Prayer (London: A.R.
Mowbray, 1910)
The English Missal (London: W. Knott
& Son, 1933)
The English Catholic
Prayer Book (London: Faith Press, n.d.)
[23] Ronald Knox, A Spiritual Aeneid (London: Burns Oates, 1958), 16-24
[24] Knox, A
Spiritual Aeneid, 68
[26] Charles Williams, ed. The Letters of Evelyn Underhill (London: Longmans, Green and Co.,
1943)
[28] C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm (London: Collins Fontana Books, 1966), 106
[29] ‘Cronaca Contemporanea: Visita ufficiale del
Primate Anglicano al Papa’ in Civilta
Cattolica 117 (1966), 190. Quoted in Robert Hale, Canterbury and Rome: Sister Churches (London: Darton, Longman and
Todd, 1982), 20
[30] Stuart Anderson, Personal Communication, 1998
[31] Martin Davies, “How might Eliot’s ideas
about literary tradition transpose themselves into ideas pertaining to English
spiritual tradition?” Unpublished essay for The
Anglican Years, Centre for Christian Spirituality, 2003
[32] T.S. Eliot, Collected Poems (London: Faber and Faber, 1963), 222
[33] A.M. Allchin, The Dynamic of Tradition (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1981),
24
[34] Paul Murray, T.S. Eliot and Mysticism
(London: Macmillan, 1971) 7
[35] Esther de Waal, Celtic Light (London: HarperCollins Fount, 1991)
[36] Esther de Waal, Personal Communication, July 2000
[37] The reference is sequentially to the named
themes of this sentence, as evidenced in:
Rowan
Williams, On Christian Theology
(Oxford: Blackwell, 2000)