Book Review: Belloc on Cranmer

Please note that I received a copy of this book, Cranmer by Hilaire Belloc from Mysterium Press, the publisher, in exchange for my review and comments. The book is sold in the USA by Os Justi Press, but is as of this writing Out of Stock! More to come, I presume.

Something important to note about this book: Belloc wrote it based upon the work of Professor Alfred W. Pollard, Thomas Cranmer and The English Reformation. A brief notice dated on the Feast of the Assumption in 1931 at the beginning of the book tells us:

This is not a life of Cranmer: it is but a study of his character and motives, with exposition of, and emphasis upon, his literary genius and its legacy to the Church of England. . . .

Belloc explains that he has based most of the facts he narrates "on the scholarship of Professor Pollard, as must everyone since the publication of his monograph, which treats of Cranmer as a "Hero of the Reformation."

So the facts are Pollard's but the interpretation is Belloc's, I presume. I have not read Professor Pollard's book. Belloc reserved the right to provide some notes "to such few errors as appear in that work and call for correction."

Table of Contents:

1. The Beginning

2. Cambridge

3. The Accidental Entry

4. The Testing

5. The Call

6. The Divorce to Order

7. The First Peril

8. Back to Heel

9. The Bible

10. The Hoodwinking of Henry

11. The Second Peril

12. Cranmer Set Free

13. The Resistance of the English

14. The Third Peril

15. The Ordeal

16. The Fire

One thing about Belloc we can be certain of is that he has definite opinions of the characters in his historical studies! In his analysis of Thomas Cranmer's life and career in service to the Tudors and the Reformation, Belloc is convinced that aside from his great artistry in English prose, Cranmer had few qualities to recommend him. As the publisher's blurb attests: "A timid, furtive, scholar, unduly raised to aid the king’s divorce, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer lived a double life. Under the penalty of public ministry he burned within – forced to put his best years into the system which he yearned in secret to destroy, and to send back to the continent his own unlawful bride." 

He failed as a diplomat for Henry VIII's Great Matter on the Continent when ambassador to the Court of the Holy Roman Emperor, he was wavering in his loyalty to people and causes, and his main goal in life seems, in Belloc's mind, to be protecting himself and surviving. Until the end, perhaps.

Evidences of this survival instinct offered by Belloc: Cranmer did nothing to save John Frith, condemned to being burned alive at the stake for denying the Real Presence (and the doctrine of Purgatory) in 1533, while Cranmer did not believe in the Real Presence (it would not have been convenient to admit it at that time!); Cranmer, anachronistically speaking, threw Anne Boleyn under the bus once it was clear that she was going to be declared guilty and executed (his first peril). At first he protested that he couldn't really believe she would have been so unfaithful to Henry but soon acquiesced to reality. Belloc proposes that when Cranmer visited Anne Boleyn he used a technique--previously used against poor Elizabeth Barton, the Nun of Kent in 1533--of seeming sympathy to extract more information. Belloc says that Anne Boleyn was convinced she'd be released and sent into exile in Antwerp at the end of her interview with Cranmer! Cranmer evaded disaster again when Cromwell fell--writing a letter to Henry VIII again to demonstrate that his fealty was to Henry VIII alone (his second peril).

Belloc emphasizes that even after Cranmer had rejected Catholic doctrine about the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Real Presence of Jesus in Holy Communion, adopting a Zwinglian (not Lutheran) view, while Henry VIII was alive, he celebrated Holy Mass consistently (although if he did not intend what the Church intends, none of those Masses was valid). He also notes that when Cranmer became the Archbishop of Canterbury, he was subservient to Thomas Cromwell, the Vicegerent of the King in Spirituals who took over administration of the Church in England (Cromwell had "supplanted the bishops" Belloc notes on page 109). Cromwell and Cranmer connive to sneak in Tyndale's English translation of Holy Bible against Henry VIII's objections to it, but Belloc wonders about Cranmer's frustration during the last years of Henry's reign as the King would not permit his changes in Catholic Church doctrine and liturgy. 

Once Henry dies, however, like King Hamlet's Ghost ("Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'd,/No reckoning made, but sent to my account/With all my imperfections on my head:/O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!") and without a tomb prepared, "Cranmer [Is] Set Free"! Edward Seymour becomes Protector and guardian of the minor, King Edward VI, who is raised as thoroughly Protestant and anti-Catholic. As Belloc notes, Cranmer's main target was the Catholic Mass as a Sacrifice. It must be destroyed and replaced, gradually, given the Common's devotion to it, but irrevocably. He made other changes in prayer and belief, detailed in the 42 Articles of the Church of England in 1553, but these never took effect because of the brevity of Edward's reign.

On pages 184 and 185, while describing Edward VI's Coronation, Belloc explains how Cranmer elevated Edward VI so highly above the Church in authority and power that he was nearly Divine--the Divine Right of Kings. At the same address, Cranmer told the bishops they were no longer the Successors of the Apostles; the sees they'd received from Henry VIII--not from the Vicar of Christ in Rome--were forfeit until assigned to them by the new Vicar of Christ in England, Edward VI. What a prevenient blow to the project of the Tractarian Movement centuries later!

When it comes to the 1549/1552 Book of Common Prayer, however much Belloc regrets the liturgical and doctrinal changes Cranmer made, he admits there's "a quality of literary beauty, of excellence in English prose, unsurpassed in anything before or since his time." After listing all Cranmer's bad qualities (hypocrisy, timer-serving, cowardice, timidity) and good qualities (suavity, courtesy, kindness, etc), Belloc praises one special talent: "He was a master of the Word, he possessed the secret of magic. He had been granted power in that which is perhaps the highest medium we know of expression among men, English at its highest." (pp. 198-199) Belloc highlights the Litany, the Collects, the prefaces and other prayers as treasures of England.

Finally, the illness and decline of young king Edward VI, and the plan of Duke of Northumberland to thwart Henry VIII's will and plan for succession to bring Lady Jane Grey to the throne after the former's death, bring about Cranmer's third peril. If the Princess Mary, a devout Catholic comes to the throne, all his work to change the religion of England would be lost, so he goes along with the plot.

Northumberland, Paget, Grey, and others did not account for the loyalty of the people to the rightful heir--nor with Henry Fitzalan, 12th Earl of Arundel (Belloc presumes) warning Mary of her arrest. They should have had her in custody before Edward died. As Belloc notes, however, even after Mary in declared rightful queen and begins her reign, she did not take immediate revenge--not until the Wyatt Rebellion. Then the executions (for those already found guilty of treason) and trials for heresy began.

In the last two chapters, "The Ordeal" and "The Fire", Belloc narrates the story of those heresy trials and of Cranmer writing his recantations of his denials of Catholic doctrine and practice, that is, of the heresies he had refused to adjure at trial, all in the hopes of saving his life after Ridley and Latimer and he had been found guilty of heresy, and after the other two bishops had been burned at the stake in Oxford. 

He seems to have repented with his pen most heartily. But when no pardon was given, he turned against all that repentance and went eagerly to the stake, running down Brasenose Lane, standing at the stake, repenting for his recantation, and holding his right hand that wrote that recantation "steadfastly into the flame. . . . till flame and smoke hid all. This is the way in which Cranmer died." (p. 255)

Belloc ends the volume there without commentary or analysis, which I find interesting. He lets Cranmer's last words and dying gestures speak for themselves. Otherwise, throughout the volume Belloc has provided the reader with thorough analysis of the all the controversies, plots, and events of Cranmer's involvement in Henry VIII's Great Matter, the rise and fall of queens, consorts, courtiers, and bishops, plots and negotiations, politics and policy, all in his own masterful style. 

I certainly hope that Mysterium Press will be able to publish more of Belloc's biographies of English monarchs, etc., and that Os Justi will offer them in the USA.

Image Credit (Public Domain): Cranmer burning at the stake from Foxe's Book of Martyrs.

Johannes Vermeer, RIP, December 15, 1675

Believe it or not, there is a connection between the death of Johannes Vermeer and the English Reformation, the topic of this blog! The connection is the relationship between Church and State, always fraught with difficulty, but especially when the State chooses an official church and religion. The artist Johannes Vermeer became a Catholic when he married, and this site notes:

By the time Vermeer's parents were married in 1615, the suppression of the public celebration of the Catholic faith in Delft was complete. But even though national decrees denied Catholics the right to serve public office, many areas of the Netherlands remained solidly Roman Catholic. Despite the hostility, Dutch Catholics continued to worship and educate their children throughout the 17th century. In large cities like Amsterdam, Haarlem and Utrecht, commercial concerns dampened repeated calls for anti-Catholic laws. Although intolerance existed in the United Provinces, on the whole Dutch Catholics enjoyed remarkable freedoms compared with religious minorities elsewhere in early modern Europe. Penal laws against Catholics were occasionally enforced and Catholics were vulnerable to extortion, but things could have been far worse.

Vermeer very probably converted to Catholicism upon his marriage to Catharina Bolnes [in 1653] and there is no sign that his decision had negative repercussions on his career. The most influential painter in Delft and friend of the Vermeer family, Leonaert Bramer as well as the popular painter of Dutch family life, Jan Steen were noted Catholics.

So, like Catholics in England, Catholics in the Netherlands had to worship secretly--that line "things could have been far worse" might indeed be applied to English Catholics during the 17th century. Since this painting dates to 1670-1672, English Catholics were still under the Penal and Recusancy laws that made it an act of treason for a priest to be in England and a felony for a layperson to assist a Catholic priest in any way--although there was a hiatus in the persecution of Catholics during those years of Charles II's reign. It would start up again after the Fire of London and while Titus Oates' nefarious conspiracy of a conspiracy ran its perjurous course.

Catholics in the Netherlands were allowed to worship in schiulkerk, or hidden churches, as long as they kept it quiet.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City has this Vermeer currently on display. Its description:

One of Vermeer's most unusual pictures, this large canvas was probably commissioned by a Catholic patron. The subject was adopted from a standard handbook of iconography, Cesare Ripa's "Iconologia." Vermeer interpreted Ripa's description of Faith with the "world at her feet" literally, showing a Dutch globe published in 1618. The divine world is suggested by the glass sphere hanging overhead. The painting of the Crucifixion on the wall copies a work by Jacob Jordaens. Among the several Christological symbols, the most prominent are the apple, emblem of the first sin, and the serpent (Satan) crushed by a stone (Christ, the "cornerstone" of the church). Dating from about 1670, the work strikes a balance between abstraction and haunting similitude.

Painted about 1670–72, this picture presents an allegory of Vermeer's adopted religion, and was probably made expressly for a private Catholic patron or for a schuilkerk, a hidden Catholic church. It is unlike any other work by Vermeer, though it shows compositional similarities to The Art of Painting (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna) of about 1666–68. The latter work is also allegorical in subject, but only nominally, as it was intended mainly as a virtuosic display of the artist's abilities. In the MMA canvas, Vermeer shifts his late style towards a more classicist and schematic manner.

The choice and interpretation of the imagery included here would have been discussed by the artist and his patron. For many of the allegorical motifs, Vermeer must have turned to Cesare Ripa's emblem book, Iconologia (Rome, 1603), translated in a Dutch edition by Dirck Pietersz Pers (Amsterdam, 1644). The female figure represents the Catholic Faith, wearing white, a symbol of purity, and blue, the "hue of heaven". A hand raised to the heart indicates the source of living faith. She rests her foot on a globe, published in 1618 by Jodocus Hondius, to illustrate Ripa's description of Faith with "the world under her feet". In the foreground, Vermeer shows the "cornerstone" of the Church (Christ) crushing a serpent (Satan). The nearby apple, which has been bitten, stands for original sin. The table is transformed into an altar with the addition of a chalice, crucifix, and a Bible or, more likely because of its proximity to other objects used for the Mass, a missal. The glass sphere, hanging from a ribbon, was a popular decorative curiosity; in this context, it may be viewed as a symbol of heaven or God. The room itself, with its high ceiling, marble floor, and a large altarpiece based on a work by Jacob Jordaens (possibly identical with one in Vermeer's estate), was meant to be recognized by contemporary viewers as a private chapel installed within a large house or some other secular building. Though apparently an illusionistic device, the tapestry at left would also have been understood as part of a very large hanging, drawn aside to reveal a normally secluded space.

This book, published by Harvard University Press, covers the era: Faith on the margins: Catholics and Catholicism in the Dutch Golden Age by Charles H. Parker and this book even compares the two minority communities of Catholics in England and the Netherlands. And Vermeer is in the news with the release of Tim's Vermeer, a movie about a man's efforts to figure out how Vermeer composed his paintings so perfectly balancing light and shadow, using a camera obscura.

Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary

On the 1962 Missal liturgical calendar, today we celebrate the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary along with the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost. As this article from EWTN's library notes:

The origin of this Feast is sought in Palestine. It goes back to the consecration of a church in Jerusalem, which tradition identifies as that of the present basilica of St. Ann.

At Rome the Feast began to be kept toward the end of the 7th century, brought there by Eastern monks. Gradually and in varied ways it spread to the other parts of the West in the centuries that followed. From the 13th century on, the celebration assumed notable importance, becoming a Solemnity with a major Octave and preceded by a Vigil calling for a fast. The Octave was reduced to a simple one during the reform of St. Pius X and was abolished altogether under the reform of Pius XII in 1955.

The present Calendar characterizes the Birth of Mary as a "Feast," placing it on the same plane as the Visitation.

For some centuries now, the Birth has been assigned to September 8 both in the East and in the West, but in ancient times it was celebrated on different dates from place to place. However, when the Feast of the Immaculate Conception (which has a later origin than that of the Birth) was extended to the whole Church, the Birth little by little became assigned everywhere to September 8: nine months after the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception.

A poem on the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary by St. Robert Southwell:

Joye in the risinge of our orient starr,
That shall bringe forth the Sunne that lent her light;
Joy in the peace that shall conclude our warr,
And soone rebate the edge of Satan's spight;
Load-starr of all engolfd in worldly waves,
The card and compasse that from shipwracke saves.

The patriark and prophettes were the floures
Which Tyme by course of ages did distill,
And culld into this little cloude the shoures
Whose gracious droppes the world with joy shall fill;
Whose moysture suppleth every soule with grace,
And bringeth life to Adam's dyinge race.

For God, on Earth, she is the royall throne,
The chosen cloth to make His mortall weede;
The quarry to cutt out our Corner-stone,
Soyle full of fruite, yet free from mortall seede;
For heavenly floure she is the Jesse rodd
The childe of man, the parent of God.

Carcanet Press published The Collected Poems of Robert Southwell, SJ in 2007:

INCLUDES AN INTRODUCTION AND AFTERWORD BY ANN SWEENEY AND AN ESSAY BY PETER DAVIDSON

One of our earliest English critics, Ben Jonson, famously wished that he had written Southwell's 'Burning Babe', the most famous poem of the body of spiritual verse written by the Elizabethan priest, poet and martyr S. Robert Southwell SJ (1561-95). This book is a complete, authentic edition of Southwell's poems, in English and Latin, offering new texts based on the very manuscripts which were circulated in secret among English Catholics in the years following the poet's death. By re-examining these contemporary manuscripts, this edition allows Southwell's poems to regain some of their original purpose of communicating forbidden theologies and doctrines amongst a criminalised and near-silenced readership of secret groups. These are the poems of those Catholics who did not or could not flee the country as the Elizabethan State bore down upon their faith in the last two decades of the sixteenth century.

Audacious and beautiful in themselves, Southwell's poems were also immensely influential in the the development of early modern English literature; his new visions and visualisations bear their fruit a generation later in the works of Donne and Herbert. Southwell's rare Latin verses, available here for the first time, accompanied by a new translation, demonstrate the significant creative debt owed to him by the Augustans, even by Milton.

Here is a review of the collection.

Just a note that the celebration of Queen Elizabeth I's birthday on September 7 always upstaged this feast during the queen's reign, although the Church of England does include the Birth of the Virgin Mary on its liturgical calendar today.

Hilaire Belloc, RIP

When Belloc ran for Parliament in 1906, his campaign manager begged him not to mention his Catholicism--so Belloc proclaimed during one of his speeches (when heckled for being a "Papist"): "Gentlemen, I am a Catholic. As far as possible, I go to Mass every day. This (taking a rosary out of his pocket) is a rosary. As far as possible, I kneel down and tell these beads every day. If you reject me on account of my religion, I shall thank God that he has spared me the indignity of being your representative." Of course, he was elected.

What a lion of the Faith! Hilaire Belloc died on July 16, 1953, eleven days shy of his 83rd birthday.

As Frederick Wilhelmson said of Belloc:

Born and baptized in the Church, a Catholic from childhood, his love and appreciation of the Faith came to him when young, but it came somewhat slowly. Of his inner life he tells us very little. French on his fathers side, Belloc it must be remembered did his military service in the French artillery, thus delaying his entrance into Oxford when he finally made up his mind to remain an Englishman. His spoken French remained that of a rough cannoneer. Latin European culture was the air he breathed in his youth and to which he returned whenever he could, even sailing across the channel to replenish his reserves of wine.

Were I to seek one scriptural passage which sums up Bellocs vision of the Faith, it would be: By their fruits ye shall know them (Mt 6:30). Aided here by a powerful visual imagination which was brought to bear in his many military histories, Belloc could see the Church at work down the ages and he adored what he saw. The Church made Europe and in so doing quickened the old Roman Order, in disrepair but by no means destroyed by the Germanic tribes from the north. All our typical Western institutions were either created by Catholic men from out of nothing or were inherited from our pagan forefathers and then quickened from within by the yeast of Christianity. Although the terms incarnational and eschatological were not current in Belloc's lifetime, he is a prime instance of a man with an incarnational understanding of religious truth. Belloc looked for blessings everywhere, and the whole of Christendom was for him an immense network of actual graces.

In addition to the book pictured above, TAN Books/St. Benedict's Press publishes several of his 153 or so books. A Path to Rome, The Servile State, and Characters of the Reformation are among my favorite works by Belloc! May he rest in peace. He is buried at Our Lady of Consolation Church in West Grinstead, Sussex.

The English Reformation and "Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran School v. EEOC"

The recent decision from The Supreme Court of the United States of American reversing a Sixth Circuit Court decision was written by Chief Justice Roberts. He cites the history of religious conflict in England from King John and the Magna Carta to Henry VIII and the Act of Supremacy--and beyond, to the colonies of "New England":

Controversy between church and state over religious offices is hardly new. In 1215, the issue was addressed in the very first clause of Magna Carta. There, King John agreed that “the English church shall be free, and shall have its rights undiminished and its liberties unimpaired.” The King in particular accepted the “freedom of elections,”a right “thought to be of the greatest necessity and importance to the English church.” J. Holt, Magna Carta App. IV, p. 317, cl. 1 (1965).

That freedom in many cases may have been more theoretical than real. See, e.g., W. Warren, Henry II 312(1973) (recounting the writ sent by Henry II to the electorsof a bishopric in Winchester, stating: “I order you to hold a free election, but forbid you to elect anyone but Richard my clerk”). In any event, it did not survive the reign of Henry VIII, even in theory. The Act of Supremacy of 1534, 26 Hen. 8, ch. 1, made the English monarch the supreme head of the Church, and the Act in Restraint of Annates, 25 Hen. 8, ch. 20, passed that same year, gave him the authority to appoint the Church’s high officials. See G. Elton, The Tudor Constitution: Documents and Commentary 331–332 (1960). Various Acts of Uniformity, enacted subsequently, tightened further the government’s grip onthe exercise of religion. See, e.g., Act of Uniformity, 1559,1 Eliz., ch. 2; Act of Uniformity, 1549, 2 & 3 Edw. 6, ch. 1. The Uniformity Act of 1662, for instance, limited service as a minister to those who formally assented to prescribed tenets and pledged to follow the mode of worship set forth in the Book of Common Prayer. Any minister who refusedto make that pledge was “deprived of all his Spiritual Promotions.” Act of Uniformity, 1662, 14 Car. 2, ch. 4.

Seeking to escape the control of the national church, the Puritans fled to New England, where they hoped to elect their own ministers and establish their own modes of worship. See T. Curry, The First Freedoms: Church and State in America to the Passage of the First Amendment 3 (1986); McConnell, The Origins and Historical Understanding of Free Exercise of Religion, 103 Harv. L. Rev.1409, 1422 (1990). William Penn, the Quaker proprietor of what would eventually become Pennsylvania and Delaware, also sought independence from the Church of England. The charter creating the province of Pennsylvania contained no clause establishing a religion. See S. Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America 440–441 (1970).

Colonists in the South, in contrast, brought the Church of England with them. But even they sometimes chafed at the control exercised by the Crown and its representatives over religious offices. In Virginia, for example, the law vested the governor with the power to induct ministers presented to him by parish vestries, 2 Hening’s Statutes at Large 46 (1642), but the vestries often refused to make such presentations and instead chose ministers on their own. See H. Eckenrode, Separation of Church and State in Virginia 13–19 (1910). Controversies over the selection of ministers also arose in other Colonies with Anglican establishments, including North Carolina. See C. Antieau, A. Downey, & E. Roberts, Freedom from Federal Establishment: Formation and Early History of the First Amendment Religion Clauses 10–11 (1964). There, the royal governor insisted that the right of presentation lay with the Bishop of London, but the colonial assembly enacted laws placing that right in the vestries. Authorities in England intervened, repealing those laws as inconsistent with the rights of the Crown. See id., at 11; Weeks, Church and State in North Carolina, Johns Hopkins U. Studies in Hist. & Pol. Sci., 11th Ser., Nos. 5–6, pp. 29–36 (1893).

It was against this background that the First Amendment was adopted. Familiar with life under the established Church of England, the founding generation sought to foreclose the possibility of a national church. See 1 Annals of Cong. 730–731 (1789) (noting that the Establishment Clause addressed the fear that “one sect might obtain a pre-eminence, or two combine together, and establish a religion to which they would compel others to conform” (remarks of J. Madison)). . . .

Chief Justice Roberts goes on to cite a proof text of the government's non-interference in the naming of church ministers, in connection with the Catholic Church and the firt Archbishop of Baltimore, John Carroll:

The first [example] occurred in 1806, when John Carroll, the first Catholic bishop in the United States, solicited the Executive’s opinion on who should be appointed to direct the affairs of the Catholic Church in the territory newly acquired by the Louisiana Purchase. After consulting with President Jefferson, then-Secretary of State Madison responded that the selection of church “functionaries” was an “entirely ecclesiastical” matter left to the Church’s own judgment. Letter from James Madison to Bishop Carroll (Nov. 20, 1806), reprinted in 20 Records of the American Catholic Historical Society 63 (1909). The “scrupulous policy of the Constitution in guarding against a political interference with religious affairs,” Madison explained, prevented the Government from rendering an opinion on the “selection of ecclesiastical individuals.” Id., at 63–64.

It is interesting that Roberts does not cite Maryland and the Lords Baltimore in the paragraph on the Puritans and the Quakers.

St. Nicholas Day and Boy Bishops

On December 6, the feast of St. Nicholas of Myra, it was common throughout England and on the Continent during the Middle Ages that a Boy Bishop would be chosen at the monasteries and cathedral schools from among the boys in the choir or school. He would be vested as a bishop, lead a procession and bless the people on St. Nicholas's Day. The boy bishop remained in office until the Feast of the Holy Innocents on December 28--of course, he did not celebrate any sacramental rites during this time.

This was a very popular custom representing a change in order: the real Bishop stepped down in humility while the young boy stepped up from his lowliness. This quotes Mary's Magnificat: "He hath put down the mighty from their seat: and hath exalted the humble and meek." It was common that the Boy Bishop would distribute treats and declare holidays.

Henry VIII abolished the practice in 1542; Mary revived it during her reign and Elizabeth abolished it again--more about the tradition and its current status here.

University Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Oxford

The University Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Oxford is an informal shrine to many historical events and persons. When I have visited it, I have had these things in mind:

• Blessed Duns Scotus preached there in the early 1300's (more about him later this week)


• Anglicans Cranmer, Ridley and Latimer were tried on heresy charges at St. Mary's during the reign of Mary I and found guilty


• Blessed William Hartley smuggled in 400 copies of St. Edmund Campion's "Decem Rationes" for the students to read, creating quite a furor


• Charles I used St. Mary's for worship during the English Civil War (while a Catholic chapel was set up for Henrietta Maria at Merton College)


• John Wesley attended services while a student and preached a few sermons while Fellow at Lincoln College in the 1740's--including his last in 1742 when he really went after the lukewarmness of the administration and the other Fellows (never invited back)


• John Keble preached the "National Apostasy" sermon, beginning the Oxford Movement (at least in John Henry Newman's view) on July 14, 1833


• Blessed John Henry Newman was Vicar of the University Church, preaching such popular sermons that even the colleges' changing the time of tea didn't dissuade the students from attending


• C.S. Lewis gave his "Weight of Glory" talk there in 1942

So anyone with interest in any of those people and events will find something at St. Mary the Virgin, including bullet holes in the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary above the entrance, courtesy of the Roundheads! (Or be someone like me, thinking of all them jumbled up without "bullets"!) In addition, there's a nice gift shop, cafe, and view of the Radcliffe Camera.

November 30, 1554: A New Holy Day

On November 30, 1554, Reginald Cardinal Pole, the Papal Legate, soon to be Archbishop of Canterbury, received the submission of the English Parliament and granted absolution to the entire kingdom, reconclining England to the Holy See and the universal Catholic Church. As both Alison Weir and H.F.M. Prescott comment in their biographies of Mary I, the first Queen Regnant of England and Ireland, this must have been one of the happiest days of her life as she witnessed this solemn act. She was married to Philip of Spain, her cousin had returned, Parliament and Convocation were both repenting of the acts led by her father and her half-brother to separate England from the Catholic Church--and she believed she was pregnant (as her doctors had told her).

For this day to occur, several things had to be arranged and decided. First of all, for the Papal Legate to arrive in England, the Act of Attainder against Reginald Pole had to be removed by Parliament. This was the Act that condemned his mother Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, and many others to death. Parliament lifted this sentence of death and Mary invited the Papal Legate to return from exile on November 20, 1554. He would be the first Papal Legate present in England since the trial of her mother's marriage in 1529--when Katherine of Aragon appeared before Cardinal Campeggio and Cardinal Wolsey, appealed to Henry her husband and left the Court, impervious to pleas to return.

The matter of former Church lands also had to be decided: Henry VIII and then Edward VI had seized the monasteries and then the chantries and the chantry schools, destroyed most of them, sold or given the lands to courtiers and others who benefitted. Were these all to be given back?

The Papal Legate wanted them back, but Mary was more concerned about alienating the Court and nobility her reign had so lately unified against the plots of Northumberland to replace her in the succession with Lady Jane Grey and that of Thomas Wyatt the younger to prevent the Spanish marriage and place her half-sister Elizabeth and young Edward Courtenay on the throne. So the lands and property stayed with their current owners.

On November 28 Cardinal Pole spoke to Parliament and asked them to repeal all the other acts that were obstacles to reunion. On November 29 Parliament did so and then petitioned Queen Mary to intercede with the Papal Legate for absolution and reunion with Rome (two members refused to sign the petition).

Then on St. Andrew's Day Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester and Mary's Chancellor, led the members of both houses of Parliament to kneel before the Papal Legate and Mary, presenting the petition. The petition proclaimed that Parliament was "very sorry and repentant of the schism and disobedience committed in this realm against the See Apostolic" and begged to be returned "into the bosom and unity of Christ's Church."

Cardinal Pole then welcomed "the return of the lost sheep" and granted absolution to the entire kingdom, proclaiming a new Holy Day on November 30: the Feast of Reconciliation.

As readers might remember, not quite two weeks ago (November 17) I posted a reflection on the day this Catholic revival ended in England when Mary and Pole died on the same day in 1558. They did not live long enough to celebrate the fourth anniversary of this great day! This event took place in the Palace of Whitehall which Henry VIII had taken from Cardinal Wolsey after his fall. Whitehall, except for the Banqueting Hall, burned down in 1698.

St. Werburgh and Chester Cathedral

Following up on the surrender of Fountains Abbey, let's look at the Chester Abbey church that became Chester Cathedral in 1541. It was surrendered in January of 1540. The church at Chester had been famed as the site of St. Werburgh's tomb. St. Werburgh was a seventh century royal Benedictine abbess. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia of 1912, she was

born in Staffordshire early in the seventh century; died at Trentham, 3 February, 699or 700. Her mother was St. Ermenilda, daughter of Ercombert, King of Kent, and St. Sexburga, and her father, Wulfhere, son of Penda the fiercest of the Mercian kings. St. Werburgh thus united in her veins the blood of two very different races: one fiercely cruel and pagan; the other a type of gentle valour and Christian sanctity. In her, likewise, centred the royal blood of all the chief Saxon kings, while her father on the assassination of his elder brother Peada, who had been converted to Christianity, succeeded to the largest kingdom of the heptarchy. . . . On account of her beauty and grace the princess was eagerly sought in marriage, chief among her suitors being Werebode, a headstrong warrior, to whom Wulfhere was much indebted; but the constancy of Werbrugh overcame all obstacles so that at length she obtained her father's consent to enter the Abbey of Ely, which had been founded by her great- aunt, St. Etheldra, and the fame of which was widespread.

When her uncle Ethelred succeeded to the throne, he asked St. Werburgh to take on a great challenge:

This king invited St. Werburgh to assume the direction of all the monasteries of nuns in his dominion, in order that she might bring them to that high level of discipline and perfection which had so often edified him at Ely. The saint with some difficulty consented to sacrifice the seclusion she prized, and undertook the work of reforming the existing Mercian monasteries, and of founding new ones which King Ethelred generously endowed, namely, Trentham and Hanbury, in Staffordshire, and Weedon, in Northamptonshire. It had been the privilege of St. Werburgh to be trained by saints; at home by St. Chad (afterwards Bishop of Lichfield), and by her mother, and in the cloister by her aunt and grandmother. Her position worked no change in the humility which had always characterized her, so that in devotedness to all committed to her care she seemed rather the servant than the mistress. Her sole thought was to excel her sisters in the practice of religious perfection. God rewarded her childlike trust by many miracles, which have made St. Werburgh one of the best known and loved of the Saxon saints.

After her death:

So numerous and marvellous were the cures worked at the saint's tomb that in 708 her body was solemnly translated to a more conspicuous place in the church, in the presence of her brother, Kenred, who had now succeeded King Ethelred. In spite of having been nine years in the tomb, the body was intact. So great was the impression made on Kenred that he resolved to resign his crown and followed in his sister's footsteps. In 875, through fear of the Danes and in order to show greater honour to the saint, the body was removed to Chester. The Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, on the site of the present cathedral of Chester, was rededicated to St. Werburgh and St. Oswald, most probably in the reign of Athelstan. The great Leofric, Earl of Mercia (who was likewise styled Earl of Chester), and his wife, Lady Godiva, repaired and enlarged the church, and in 1093, Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester, richly endowed the abbey and its church. By the instrumentality of this noble, Chester, which had been in the hands of secular canons, became a great Benedictine abbey, the name of St. Anselm, then a monk at Bee, being associated with this transformation.

Her shrine, of course, was demolished and her remains scattered with the dissolution of the abbey. According to the wikipedia article (source of the image above), Chester Cathedral is a magnificent Norman/Gothic structure. It was, however, one of those cathedrals that suffered much damage, especially to its stained glass, from Parliamentary troops in the English Civil War. St. Werburgh is still the patron saint of Chester, and this site provides some detail of her reconstructed shrine.

Thomas Tallis, RIP

Thomas Tallis, musician and composer, died on November 23, 1585. My favorite recordings of the music of Thomas Tallis are by The Tallis Scholars and Stile Antico.

From the liner notes for The Tallis Scholars Sing Thomas Tallis CD set posted on the Gimell Records website, Peter Phillips comments:

My view of Tallis's genius has only deepened with time. Not only was he the arch-survivor but also, unlike those who trim and so build their monuments on shifting sands, he had the ability to create masterpieces in whatever style was the currency of the day. This should not be underestimated, because those styles changed out of recognition during his eighty-or-so years. First it was the traditional Catholic style of Henry VIII's reign; then it was the most severely chordal Protestant style of Edward VI's reign; then it was back to Latin and Catholic writing again under Mary, though this time in a more mature idiom than in Henry's reign - Tallis was by now turning fifty; then it was the compromise style for Elizabeth whom he served for twenty-six years and who left him sufficiently alone for him to produce some of his greatest music.

The two CD set contains examples from each of Tallis's styles. His first style, Phillips notes, is marked by the use of melismas: "A melisma is a melodic line which only uses one syllable, like the ‘A' of Amen, allowing the composer's imagination to fly free of text-setting. This essentially abstract way of thinking was admired by the pre-Reformation Catholics, and needless to say was particularly objected to by the Protestants."

Tallis's second style, when he wrote for Edward VI: "Nothing could be further removed from the glories of Spem or Gaude gloriosa. Gone are the melismas, the Latin texts, the interweaving of the lines in polyphony. The accent was now on simplicity and comprehension - hence the English texts and the chordal style, which was designed to make the words audible."

And, finally, his mature and late style: "Nowhere is Tallis's mature style more perfectly on display than in his two sets of Lamentations, which in modern times have been the yardstick by which every set of Lamentations of the period is judged, whether English or from the Continent. . . . [In] Tallis's late style . . . he took the prevailing Flemish technique of imitative entries between the voices, built up a full sonority as each voice joined in, and then moved on to the next phrase of words and the next set of entries. It is a transparent idiom in which the words are set more or less syllabically - thus fulfilling the Protestant need for clarity - yet the music is allowed to expand and breathe."

Stile Antico's Heavenly Harmonies juxtaposes Thomas Tallis's Protestant psalm tunes with William Byrd's Catholic motets and the Mass propers for Pentecost.

Of William Byrd on The Tallis Scholars CD Playing Elizabeth's Tune, Peter Phillips noted that:

Although Byrd was a genius to rival his teacher, Thomas Tallis, he was not required to write church music in quite so many styles as Tallis did - the political and religious situation in England in Byrd's lifetime was a little more settled. Nonetheless he had to face up to the same basic challenge as Tallis: to write music for the Protestant authorities when arguably his heart wasn't really in it; and to find opportunities to write the kind of music he really wanted to write - for the Catholic liturgy - and not be arrested for it. As in Tallis's time the compositional methods required for those two traditions were different. The Protestants wanted their music to have English words which could be heard, requiring a style which was simple enough to enable that to happen. The Catholic tradition, by this time fairly remote from Byrd, still favoured Latin texts and a style which in theory could be more elaborate. However in practice, as this disc shows, Byrd wrote quite simple music for the Catholics and, as in his Great Service, quite complex music for the Anglicans.

For an artist merely to survive is no mark of success. Perhaps it's anachronistic to assume the same level of artistic struggle to remain true to one's art (as the story of Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony demonstrates, especially with Michael Tilson Thomas's interpretation), but it's hard for me to believe that Tallis could compose the beautiful music he did in these different styles merely as a compromise to the changing religious trends of the Tudor monarchs. I just don't like to think he was a musical "Vicar of Bray". William Byrd, according to the Tallis Scholar's DVD Playing Elizabeth's Tune with its documentary by Charles Hazlewood, makes it clear that Byrd was frustrated by the dual roles he had to play: loyal subject of the monarch and faithful Catholic--did Tallis feel the same frustration?

What I'm Reading Now

Two books I'm reading now:

Salvation at Stake: Christian Martyrdom in Early Modern Europe by Brad S. Gregory. From the Harvard University Press website:

Thousands of men and women were executed for incompatible religious views in sixteenth-century Europe. The meaning and significance of those deaths are studied here comparatively for the first time, providing a compelling argument for the importance of martyrdom as both a window onto religious sensibilities and a crucial component in the formation of divergent Christian traditions and identities.

Gregory explores Protestant, Catholic, and Anabaptist martyrs in a sustained fashion, addressing the similarities and differences in their self-understanding. He traces the processes and impact of their memorialization by co-believers, and he reconstructs the arguments of the ecclesiastical and civil authorities responsible for their deaths. In addition, he assesses the controversy over the meaning of executions for competing views of Christian truth, and the intractable dispute over the distinction between true and false martyrs. He employs a wide range of sources, including pamphlets, martyrologies, theological and devotional treatises, sermons, songs, woodcuts and engravings, correspondence, and legal records. Reconstructing religious motivation, conviction, and behavior in early modern Europe, Gregory shows us the shifting perspectives of authorities willing to kill, martyrs willing to die, martyrologists eager to memorialize, and controversialists keen to dispute.

And

The She-Apostle: The Extraordinary Life and Death of Luisa de Carvajal by Glyn Redworth. From the Oxford University Press website:

Before dawn one morning in June 1612, an elderly Frenchman took charge of a carriage carrying a precious cargo near Tyburn Fields, London's notorious place of execution. It was heading for a house in Spitalfields, where a wizened Spanish woman was waiting to receive the mortal remains of freshly-martyred Catholic priests. Her name was Luisa de Carvajal and this book tells her story.

Born into a great Spanish noble family, Luisa suffered a horribly abusive childhood and from her early years hankered to become a martyr for her faith. For almost 20 years she struggled to become possibly the first female missionary of modern times. In 1605 - the year of the Gunpowder Plot - she was secreted into England by the Jesuits, despite the fact that she spoke not a word of English. To everyone's surprise including her own, she steadily assumed a prominent role within London's underground Catholic community, setting up an unofficial nunnery, offering Roman priests a secure place to live, consoling prisoners awaiting execution, importing banned books, and helping persecuted Catholics to flee abroad. Throughout this time she ran the grave risk of imprisonment and execution, yet she miraculously managed to avoid this ultimate fate in spite of being arrested on a number of occasions. This vividly written biography, the first to give equal treatment to her double life in Spain and England, is based on Luisa's own autobiographical writings, her sparkling collection of poems and letters, and the detailed reminiscences by dozens of people who worked with her. In parts humorous, the book contains Luisa's biting descriptions of the cost of living in Shakespeare's London, the poor quality of food in the capital, as well as the weekend rowdiness of the English.

I'll let you know what I think of them soon. What are you reading?

Sacred Music by Robert Parsons

I have been listening to this new CD of Tudor church music by the composer Robert Parsons. Andrew Carwood includes these interesting details about the last track on the disc, an Ave Maria:

Ave Maria has become Parsons’ most famous and well-loved motet since it was included in the Oxford Book of Tudor Anthems in 1978. Settings of the Ave Maria are not frequent in England—even William Byrd only set them as required by the liturgy in his two books of Gradualia (1605 and 1607) rather than as stand-alone pieces. Parsons simply sets the lines found in the Gospel of St Luke and has no invocation for the dead (authorized by Pope Pius V in 1568). This is a magical setting and it is not surprising that there is a beautiful ‘Amen’ coda. Initially the piece gives the impression of using a cantus firmus in the top part but it is in fact free-composed throughout. Parsons starts each medius phrase one note higher than the previous one, beginning on F and then moving up to D with long slow notes before reaching ‘benedicta tu’ when it joins the other voices in equal importance. Paul Doe has suggested that this piece might have been prompted by the early promise or subsequent plight of Mary, Queen of Scots. There is no direct evidence for this but it is not unreasonable to consider Parsons and indeed most of the mid-sixteenth-century writers—Sheppard, Tallis, White, Mundy and Tye—as Catholic sympathizers. They seem more free, more expressive, more expansive and more brave in their Latin compositions and it is tempting to speculate that in setting words from Psalms 15 and 119, the Lamentations and the Funeral Responds, they were consciously producing music with a Catholic slant. In comparison their English works tend to be shorter and less virtuosic and even the fledgling Great Services are short on excellent material, but then these mid-sixteenth-century composers were creating a new genre not previously explored and were probably writing to fulfil a set of rules which were not entirely clear. England had to wait for another generation—headed by William Byrd, Thomas Weelkes and Thomas Morley—before writing in English could achieve greatness.

Robert Parsons became a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal in 1563 and died in 1572, of drowning.

The recording was made in the Fitzalan Chapel of Arundell Castle in 2010. You can listen to extracts and read the liner notes here. Note how often Andrew Carwood highlights the religious changes of the Tudor succession while discussing the Parson's compositions and their dates.

Wow! The Glorious Revolution (Partially) Overthrown!

Yesterday, the BBC announced that the rules of succession for the UK's monarchy have been changed:

Sons and daughters of any future UK monarch will have equal right to the throne, after Commonwealth leaders agreed to change succession laws.

The leaders of the 16 Commonwealth countries where the Queen is head of state unanimously approved the changes at a summit in Perth, Australia.

It means a first-born daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge would take precedence over younger brothers.

The ban on the monarch being married to a Roman Catholic was also lifted. . . .

On scrapping the ban on future monarchs marrying Roman Catholics, Mr Cameron said: "Let me be clear, the monarch must be in communion with the Church of England because he or she is the head of that Church. But it is simply wrong they should be denied the chance to marry a Catholic if they wish to do so. After all, they are already quite free to marry someone of any other faith."

Scotland's First Minister Alex Salmond welcomed the lifting of the ban but said it was "deeply disappointing" that Roman Catholics were still unable to ascend to the throne.

"It surely would have been possible to find a mechanism which would have protected the status of the Church of England without keeping in place an unjustifiable barrier on the grounds of religion in terms of the monarchy," he said.

"It is a missed opportunity not to ensure equality of all faiths when it comes to the issue of who can be head of state."

These rules are not applied retroactively, so Princess Anne still follows her younger brothers in the line of succession and any heir who married a Catholic is still out (unless the spouse has already become an Anglican). Earlier this year, the Church of England had blocked the change that now allows an heir to the throne to marry a Catholic:

Church leaders expressed concern that if a future heir to the throne married a Roman Catholic, their children would be required by canon law to be brought up in that faith.

This would result in the constitutionally problematic situation whereby the Supreme Governor of the Church of England was a Roman Catholic, and so ultimately answerable to a separate sovereign leader, the Pope, and the Vatican.

It's not clear what changed that cleared the way for this announcement. Perhaps someday Mary Beatrice of Modena will not be the "Last Catholic Queen (consort) of England"!

October 25, 1970: Pope Paul VI and the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales

Pope Paul VI canonized the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales on October 25, 1970--although their Feast is celebrated in the dioceses of England and Wales on May 4 (since the year 2000) it's appropriate to remember that his action was not without controversy.

This document archived at EWTN describes some of the difficulty:

Some months before the Consistory the General Postulation, as well as the Vice-Postulation, had charged specialized agencies with following the whole national and provincial press of England and Wales, together with the European and American press, and sending it constantly everything that was published in connection with the Cause. At the same time it redoubled its efforts to obtain the widest and most accurate information not only on the attitude of English and Welsh Catholics, but above all on that of the Anglicans, with many of whose best qualified representatives there had long existed relations marked by sincere and brotherly frankness and a genuine spirit of mutual understanding and collaboration. The Hierarchy of England and Wales, in its turn, and in the first place Card. Godfrey's successor, His Eminence Card. Heenan, Vice-President of the Secretariat for the Union of Christians, made a point of establishing and maintaining exchanges of views with the competent authorities of the various Christian denominations in their country.
On the basis of this huge mass of material, it was established beyond al] shadow of doubt that at least 85 per cent of what had been printed in England and Wales, both on the Catholic and the non-Catholic side, far from being unfavourable to the Cause, was clearly in favour of it or at least showed great understanding for the opportuneness of the canonization. This applies to publications such as "Church Times", or the "Church of England Newspaper." and the most widely read English national papers such as "The Times", "The Guardian", "The Economist", "The Spectator" "The Daily Telegraph", "The Sunday Times" and many others.
On the other hand some foreign publications—including some well-known papers of protest—raised difficulties. It was at once clear, however, that these were based on insufficient knowledge of the complicated historical situation in which the Martyrs sacrificed their lives, and, to an even greater degree, of the present ecumenical situation in England. The latter calls for at least a minimum of concrete knowledge and cannot easily be understood by those who do not take the trouble to study it thoroughly Of course, everything possible has been done, by means of press conferences and other opportune methods, to eliminate this type of misunderstanding, generally most successfully.
A serious, serene and objective study of the whole situation led to the conclusion, therefore, that besides the numerous reasons clearly in favour of the canonization of the 40 blessed Martyrs, there were no real ecumenical objections to it, on the contrary the canonization offered considerable advantages also from the genuinely ecumenical point of view.
It was precisely these ideas that His Holiness Paul VI expressed and explained in a masterly fashion in the address he delivered on the occasion of the Consistory on May 18th, 1970, in which he announced his intention to proceed with the solemn canonization of the 40 blessed Martyrs of England and Wales on October 25th, 1970. In this address the Holy Father, besides pointing out, with serene frankness and great charity, the ecumenical value of this Cause, also laid particular stress on the fact that we need the example of these Martyrs particularly today not only because the Christian religion is still exposed to violent persecution in various parts of the world, but also because at a time when the theories of materialism and naturalism are constantly gaining ground and threatening to destroy the spiritual heritage of our civilization, the forty Martyrs—men and women from all walks of life—who did not hesitate to sacrifice their lives in obedience to the dictates of conscience and the divine will, stand out as noble witnesses to human dignity and freedom.
This declaration of the Sovereign Pontiff was received with practically unanimous approval, which showed how right the decision had been to proceed with the canonization. His address was given a great deal of attention and certainly contributed effectively to dispelling any doubts that may still have existed in certain quarters.

The New Liturgical Movement blog links information about Masses composed in honor of four of the forty: St. Ralph Sherwin, St. Edmund Arrowsmith, St. Edmund Jennings, and St. Anne Line.

England and the Papacy, Part Two: Book Review

Continuing this review of relations between England and the Papacy, let's look at this very focused book, The Cardinal Protectors of England: Rome and the Tudors Before the Reformation by William E. Wilkie, published by Cambridge University Press in 1974.

Contents:

Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1. The beginnings of the cardinal protectorship of England, 1492-1514
--The cardinals in the Roman Curia
--Henry VII and the Papacy
--Francesco Todeshini Piccolomini
--The role of Adriano Catellesi
--The search for a protector: Galeotto della Rovere and Francesco Alidosi
--The career of Christopher Bainbridge

Chapter 2. The work of the cardinal protectors, 1492-1514
--England and Piccolomini
--Ireland and Piccolomini
--The protectorship in confusion

Chapter 3. The emergence of Giulio de' Medici, 1514-18
--The choice of Giulio de' Medici as protector
--De' Medici and the Anglo-French struggle for Tournai
--Scotland after Flodden and the cardinal protector of England

Chapter 4. The emergence of Lorenzo Campeggio, 1518-24
--Campeggio's first legations in England
--The alliance of England and the Papacy with Charles V
--Pope Adrian VI: de' Medici in eclipse
--De' Medici in triumph
--Campeggio, protector at last

Chapter 5. The routine work of cardinal protectors Giulio de' Medici (1514-23) and Lorenzo Campeggio (1524-8)
--De' Medici and papal provisions to English bishoprics
--The Irish church, de' Medici and Campeggio
--England, Campeggio, and Clement VII

Chapter 6. The end of an arrangement, 1528-34
--The divorce: Campeggio under pressure from pope, England and emperor
--Campeggio in England as legate and judge
--The protector of England in the company of Charles V
--The widening rift between England and the papacy

Chapter 7. Campeggio and the failure of reconciliation, 1534-9
--The last appeal to Charles V
--The failure of reconciliation with Henry VIII
--Campeggio and Pole

List of sources and select bibliography
Index

First, a word about structure: as you might notice, Wilkie covers the same chronology in chapter 1 and 2 and chapter 5 overlaps with chapters 3 and 4. The first chapter or chapters contain the overview of the events, while the next chapters focus on particular themes and efforts during the particular protectorates. This does create some repetition. Chapters 6 and 7 get us into the King's Great Matter of his marriage to Katherine of Aragon, considering the cardinal protector's involvement.

This is really history of diplomacy, as the cardinal protector's role was to present the positions of Henry VII and Henry VIII to the Roman Curia and to the Pope. The Cardinal Protector for England (and also of Venice, or France, or the Holy Roman Emperor, etc) also smoothed the path of the monarch's nominees for different bishoprics throughout England and, during the reign of Henry VIII, Thomas Wolsey's role as papal legate. Henry VII, who succeeded as King of England when he defeated Richard III on the battlefield, needed the approval and support of the papacy for dynastic legitimacy.

Two of the Cardinals Protector became popes (Piccolomini reigned as Pius III; de'Medici as Clement VII. Henry VIII expected that his former Cardinal Protector would grant him his wishes regarding his marriage and counted on his current Protector, Lorenzo Campeggio, to support his cause. In fact, the relationship between England and the Papacy had been running smoothly during the Tudor monarchy--that is, until Henry VIII wanted the Pope and his Protector to declare his marriage to Katherine of Aragon null and void. Diplomatic history is not really my cup of tea, but this is a model of research and scholarship and is essential for background to the ecclesiastical crisis of Henry VIII's Great Matter.

England and the Papacy, Part One: Book Review

It is commonly asserted that the English never got along with the papacy--that there was a long history of conflict between the English state and the Popes. This fact is often used to explain the English Reformation as a natural development of history, occasioned finally and decisively by Henry VIII's marital crisis. These two books, however, The English Church & the Papacy in the Middle Ages, edited by C.H. Lawrence and The Cardinal Protectors of England: Rome and the Tudors before the Reformation by William E. Wilkie, may cast some doubt on that truism.

The first book was issued in 1965 and revised in 1999 by Sutton Publishing. Each chapter includes a Select Bibliography. The book does not offer biographies of the contributors. Contents:

Introduction by C.H. Lawrence
Chapter 1: The Celtic Church and the Papacy, by Kathleen Hughes
Chapter 2: The Anglo-Saxon Church and the Papacy by Veronica Ortenberg (new for the 1999 edition)
Chapter 3: From the Conquest to the Death of John by Charles Duggan
Chapter 4: The Thirteenth Century by C.H. Lawrence
Chapter 5: The Fourteenth Century by W.A. Pantin
Chapter 6: The Fifteenth Century by F.R.H. DuBoulay
Index

The first chapter is refreshingly free of the Thomas Cahill-type conflict between Celtic and Roman Catholicism in which the Roman Catholic Church is rigid and evil and the Celtic Church all humane and wonderful. Instead, Kathleen Hughes surveys the interaction between the Papacy and Celtic bishops and culture without that polemic edge, while still covering the issues about the of Easter and discipline throughout the Church.

In the second, new chapter for the 1999 edition, Veronica Ortenberg describes the very close relationship between the Catholic Church in England  and the Papacy during the Anglo-Saxon era, including of course, Pope St. Gregory the Great sending St. Augustine of Canterbury to Kent. She demonstrates how devoted Catholics in England at that time were to the Popes as the successors of St. Peter, how regularly bishops and laity travelled to Rome on pilgrimage, and how much correspondence, usually requesting and offering papal guidance, was exchanged.

As expected from the title, the third chapter covers, although with the assumption of the reader's prior knowledge of the outline of events, the conflicts between Henry II and St. Thomas a Becket, and John and Innocent III, noting that in the latter case, at least, once the crisis was resolved John gained a great deal of support from the pope, especially after making England a vassal of Innocent III.

The editor, in addition to providing the introduction, offers the chapter on the 13th century. With his background in the history of the monastic and mendicant movements, you'd expect him to include them in this chapter, and he matches your expectations.

W.A. Pantin, of course, is the author of The English Church in the Fourteenth Century, which is an essential book for knowledge of the Church in late medieval England, so his chapter is an excellent summary of the reform efforts in that century.

With the last chapter, we come into the period of Avignon Papacy, the Conciliar Movement, and the Tudor Dynasty, which sets up the transition to the William Wilkie book about the Cardinal Protectors, which I'll discuss tomorrow. I found  The English Church & the Papacy in the Middle Ages to have all the virtues and faults of a collection of essays by different authors: different writing styles, variations in points of view, etc., but all with the same high level of scholarship.

Our Lady of the Rosary

For this feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, here is my review of a book about the Rosary and Catholic Reformation, featuring an excellent chapter on the Rosary in recusant England:

The Mystery of the Rosary: Marian Devotion and the Reinvention of Catholicism by Nathan Mitchell

Although I found some of the terms that Mitchell uses off-putting and too technical (reframing, re-imagining, reinventing, renegotiating etc) and his repetitious analysis of Caravaggio's paintings (especially Madonna di Loreto) rather irritating, overall I have to give his work four stars. The book rewards careful and thoughtful reading.

He builds a strong argument for understanding the sixteenth century responses of the Roman Catholic Church to the Protestant Reformation, whether referred to as the Counter-Reformation or the Catholic Reformation, as more complex than uniform and organized programs and processes. By examining grassroots Marian devotions like the rosary, confraternities, and other means of meditation on the life of Christ (Caravaggio paintings or "The Mystical City of God" by Mary of Agreda), Mitchell demonstrates that Catholic believers in the period following the "dividing of Christendom" as Dawson calls it, embraced Catholic orthodoxy often by adapting those devotions to deeper understandings of Catholic worship, doctrine and discipline.

It is too bad that the publisher could not provide plates for the Caravaggio paintings described throughout the text. With access to the internet, I found all of them of course, but I think artwork should be included in the book when the author analyzes it to make his argument. Caravaggio's idiosyncratic way of presenting the child Jesus, Mary, St. Anne, St. Matthew or other saints in his artwork demonstrates Mitchell's argument that the Counter-Reformation/Catholic Reformation was not a monolithic movement of reform. Caravaggio includes dirty feeted pilgrims and buxom, balanced Madonnas in his works, which often offended viewers because they departed from the accepted iconography of Mary and the saints. And yet he is revealing a deeper understanding of the saints.

The chapter examining the use of the Rosary in sixteenth century England, when Catholics could not openly practice their faith, was particularly illuminating. Because they had no churches in which to worship and only seldom were able to receive the Sacraments, especially Holy Communion, Catholics used the Rosary as a focus for Eucharistic devotion and devout self-offering. Meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary does not require beads, so if beads weren't available or even too dangerous to possess, the faithful were still able to practice this devotion. It allowed Catholics in England to maintain church teaching about the Incarnation, Passion and Resurrection of Jesus as a form of catechetical devotion while reflecting on the Sacraments they SHOULD receive but weren't able to because of government persecution. When English Catholics did possess rosary beads, they were certainly emblematic of being a Catholic. In the 18th Century, as Parliament began to remove some of the restrictions on Catholics, Richard Challoner's "Garden of the Soul" provided more liturgical and sacramental devotion and guidance, but the Rosary continued as an identifying emblem of a Catholic, even in the United States during the 19th Century.

Finally, Mitchell discusses the Rosary in post-Vatican II context, framing his discussion around the term 'kitsch' to understand the endurance of the Rosary even as devotions outside of Mass and the Sacraments were often discouraged in the years following the Council. In spite of that discouragement, or even because of it, the Rosary has remained a favorite devotion among Catholics as diverse as Garry Wills and Mother Angelica, per Mitchell.

This is sometimes a rather cumbersome but more often a very illuminative examination of the Rosary and the Catholic Church's response to the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century and beyond.

This feast was once known as Our Lady of Victory because it commemorated the victory of Christendom over the invading Turks. Christopher Check's CD set is now carried by Ignatius Press and may be purchased here:

On October 7, 1571, the most important sea battle in history was fought near the mouth of what is today called the Gulf of Patras, then the Gulf of Lepanto. On one side were the war galleys of the Holy League and on the other, those of the Ottoman Turks, rowed by tens of thousands of Christian galley slaves. Although the battle decided the future of Europe, few Europeans, and even fewer European Americans, know the story, much less how close Western Europe came to suffering an Islamic conquest.

On October 7, 1911, English poet and theologian G.K. Chesterton honored the battle with what is perhaps the greatest ballad of the 20th century. He wrote this extraordinary poem while the postman impatiently waited for the copy. It was instantly popular and remained so for years. The ballad by the great GKC is no less inspiring today and is more timely than ever, as the West faces the growing threat of Islam.

In the new 3-CD set, Lepanto: The Battle That Saved The West, Christopher Check, Executive Vice President of the Rockford Institute and an expert on Lepanto, tells the exhilarating story of Lepanto, first in his own words and then through the classic poem of G.K. Chesterton.

Another Great Anthology from OUP

After highlighting the forthcoming Firmly I Believe and Truly, a new anthology of works by Catholic authors in England from the 15th to the 20th centuries, I thought of this very helpful volume edited by Robert S. Miola. It is also available from Oxford University Press:

Early Modern Catholicism makes available in modern spelling and punctuation substantial Catholic contributions to literature, history, political thought, devotion, and theology in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Rather than perpetuate the usual stereotypes and misinformation, it provides a fresh look at Catholic writing long suppressed, marginalized, and ignored. The anthology gives back voices to those silenced by prejudice, exile, persecution, or martyrdom while attention to actual texts challenges conventional beliefs about the period.

The anthology is divided into eight sections entitled Controversies, Lives and Deaths, Poetry, Instructions and Devotions, Drama, Histories, Fiction, and Documents, and includes sixteen black and white illustrations from a variety of Early Modern sources. Amongst the selections are texts which illuminate the role of women in recusant community and in the Church; the rich traditions of prayer and mysticism; the theology and politics of martyrdom; the emergence of the Catholic Baroque in literature and art; and the polemical battles fought within the Church and against its enemies. Early Modern Catholicism also provides a context that redefines the established canons of Early Modern England, including such figures as Edmund Spenser, John Donne, John Milton, William Shakespeare, and Ben Jonson.

Find more of the Table of Contents here--here's just a sample:

Controversies

Desiderius Erasmus: On the New Testament, 1516
Desiderius Erasmus: On Free Will, 1524
Thomas More: A Dialogue Concerning Heresies, 1530
Edmund Plowden: A Treatise on Mary, Queen of Scots, 1566
Nicholas Sander: A Treatise of the Images of Christ and of his Saints, 1567
Edmund Campion: A Letter to the Privy Council, 1580
Edmund Campion: The Tower Debates, 1581
Alban Langdale: Reasons why Catholics may go to Church, 1580
William Allen: A True, Sincere, and Modest Defence of English Catholics, 1584
William Allen: A Declaration of the Sentence and Deposition of Elizabeth, 1588
Henry Garnet: Of Indulgence or Pardons, 1592-6
Henry Garnet: A Treatise of Equivocation, c.1598
Juan de Mariana: On the King and the Education of the King, 1599
Robert Bellarmine: On the Authority of the Pope against William Basday, 1610
Jane Owen: An Antidote against Purgatory, 1634

Lives and Deaths
Augustine of Hippo (354-430)
Teresa of Ávila (1515-82)
Thomas More (1477-1535)
Edmund Campion (1540-81)
Margaret Clitherow (1556?-86)
William Weston (1550-1615)
Alexander Rawlins (1555?-95) and Henry Walpole (1558-95)
Toby Matthew (1577-1655)
Mary Ward (1585-1645)

Miola's Introduction, and you can read part of it with the Amazon.com Look Inside! feature, is excellent. Highly recommended.

The Society of Jesus and the English Reformation

On September 27, 1540 Pope Paul III approved the formation of the Society of Jesus. Founded by St. Ignatius of Loyola, the Society would have a great impact on post-Reformation England.  Eamon Duffy commented on the controversial decision of Reginald Cardinal Pole not to have the Jesuit order assist with the re-establishment of Catholicism in England during the reign of Mary I in his book Fires of Faith. As I mentioned in my review of Duffy's study of that reign, Pole had a different campaign planned. Many of the English martyrs mentioned on this blog were Jesuits, including most famously St. Edmund Campion and St. Robert Southworth. Forty years after the order's formation, the Jesuit mission to England began.

As the U.K. site for the Society of Jesus states:

The history of the Elizabethan Jesuits is the stuff of legends and hagiography: clandestine meetings, priest-holes, raids, escapes from the Tower of London, imprisonment, torture, and martyrdom.

There were also conflicts between the Jesuits and the secular priests over the strategy for perpetuating Catholicism in England. Some Catholics, the Appellants, wanted to demonstrate loyalty to the Queen and to England, while Father Robert Parsons, who came to England with Edmund Campion and then returned to the Continent, urged steps like the excommunication of Elizabeth I and the Spanish Armada. Jesuit colleges in France, Spain, and Italy trained young men for the mission in England.

The Jesuits in England were also involved in some manner in the plots to place Mary, Queen of Scots on the throne of England and the Gunpowder Plot; then they were suspected in the so-called Popish Plot and supported the Jacobite rebellions after the Glorious Revolution--and therefore many of them suffered execution and/or martyrdom. Titus Oates really aimed his "Popish Plot" perjury at the Jesuits, claiming a group of them met to plan the assasination of King Charles II and that all of the Jesuits in England were in on it one way or another. On the other hand, Lord Baltimore asked the Jesuits to assist in the founding of Maryland in the New World.

One excellent resource for the stories of the English Jesuits martyred during the Recusant era (Elizabeth I through Charles II) and particularly during the Popish Plot crisis is Jesuit Saints and Blesseds by Joseph Tylenda, SJ.

The French Revolution drove the English Jesuits from the Continent to Stonyhurst in England in 1794, even though the Pope had suppressed the order in 1773. As the same website comments:

In 1762 because of the Society's suppression in France, the English college in St Omer, then inside France, was transferred to Bruges. Despite the storm clouds the English Province was strong: in 1768 there were approximately 300 Jesuits, 26 of whom worked in Maryland and 136 in England.

The Society's situation in England after Pope Clement XIV's brief of 1773, Dominus ac Redemptor - suppressing the Society of Jesus - was anomalous. The Society did not exist officially in England so it could not be suppressed by the secular government. Ironically relations between secular clergy and Jesuits were extremely friendly at the time. Ex-Jesuits were able to remain united under a type of superior associated with the college then in Bruges (eventually moving to Liège and finally in 1794 to Stonyhurst) and to retain ownership of the province's not inconsiderable assets.

In 1801 the Jesuits were restored and in 1803 the English Province was restored. Finally, Catholic Emancipation in 1829 and the Restoration of the Hierarchy in 1850 led to the foundation of many Jesuit colleges--including Campion Hall in Oxford--and parishes throughout England.

Famed English Jesuits of the modern era include: Gerard Manley Hopkins, convert and poet; Frederick Copleston, the historian of philosophy; John Hungerford Pollen and Philip Caraman, historians and biographers who focused on the English recusant era of Jesuit martyrdoms; and Clifford Howell, who wrote on doctrine and worship. A more infamous Jesuit was George Tyrrell, the Modernist theologian.