The Oxford Movement

From The Christian Reader:

The Oxford Movement


In "Independence," the second episode of HBO's powerful docudrama John Adams, the title character takes the congressional floor and excoriates his fellow congressmen. Adams was keenly aware of the decision before them: to rebel against the tyrannical actions of the English crown or quietly submit. Adams knew that no compromise would ever work and in his short speech to the Second Continental Congress, he makes the point that a "third way"—a middle-ground between the two extremes—was not an option; the colonies would either stand united or fall divided.





This simple lesson from American history is one that the Christian church needs to learn. A "third way" between Protestantism and Catholicism has been sought ever since Luther. In today's excerpt from The History of Christian Thought, we read of one such group which was convinced that such a way existed: the Oxford Movement. Although the movement itself was largely a failure in its attempt to reconcile the two extremes of the Christian religion, it did boast a great deal of influence on the Church of England. Once a bastion of Protestant belief and practice, the Anglican church in England took on more of a Catholic look and feel thanks to the efforts of the Oxford Movement intellectuals. The conversion of John Henry Newman to Catholicism in 1845 was a major turning point in the Movement's focus and approach. The "third way" that it originally sought was all but abandoned in favor of a pietistic, devotional faith.



THE OXFORD MOVEMENT



In July 1833, John Keble preached a sermon to Oxford University on the subject of "national apostasy." He was protesting against proposed legislation to reduce the number of Anglican bishops, but the issues he raised went much deeper. Was the Church of England simply a state department, to be ruled by the whim of members of Parliament? Or was it something more?

Oxford University was just beginning to awaken from the long complacent drowsiness of the 18th century, when nobody had ever bothered to take exams; and for a brief period Oriel College was spearheading academic and intellectual reform. Its leading light was Keble. There is a story that while bursar of Oriel, Keble once made an error in the books that nearly cost the college almost 2,000 pounds; subsequent examination revealed that he had accidentally added the date to a list of expenses. But what he lacked in financial acumen he more than made up for in religious zeal; like many devout Englishmen of the time he was in the habit of whipping himself when he felt the promptings of sin, and he was deeply concerned for the spiritual state of the church. His sermon of 1833 prompted several of his colleagues to do something about it. They included John Henry Newman, Richard Froude and Edward Pusey, also fellows at Oriel, and William Palmer of Worcester College. Together these earnest young men launched what would become known as the Oxford Movement, which would transform the Church of England.

They felt that the church could be renewed only by returning to its roots, as exemplified in the theology and practices of the church fathers. This meant finding a middle way—the via media central to Newman's thought—between the stripped-down Christianity of Protestantism and the elaborate ritualism of Catholicism. In this they were following the lead of Anglicans of previous centuries such as Thomas Cranmer and Richard Hooker. Froude in particular was especially hostile to the Protestant Reformers and pioneered the idea that Catholicism could be a broader concept than Roman Catholicism. The Church of England could be thought of as a Catholic church, and indeed if it remained true to early Christianity then it would be more Catholic in this sense than the church presided over by the pope.

The reformers published their ideas in a wide variety of forms, chiefly the famous Tracts for the Times, which gave their movement the name Tractarianism. With his brilliant mind and devout piety, Newman was their obvious leader, but he became increasingly doubtful about the possibility of steering a course between Catholicism and Protestantism. After the furor caused by Tract 90, in which he argued that there was nothing in the Thirty-nine Articles—the official doctrine of the Church of England—contrary to the Council of Trent, Newman largely retired from public life. His conversion to Roman Catholicism in 1845, followed by that of thousands of his admirers, was a severe blow to the Church of England and to the Oxford Movement in particular.

Edward Pusey offered a more stable approach. He was the sort of person for whom the adjective staunch was invented: staunchly Anglican and staunchly conservative in theology, he was one of the very few Englishmen who had taken the trouble to go to Germany and see what was happening at Tubingen and other centers of biblical scholarship. What he saw there shocked him, not least because he realized how totally unprepared for it the Church of England was. But he was far too staunch to follow Newman to Rome. His answer was to encourage a new emphasis on liturgy and mystery, a sacramental theology that emphasized the rites of baptism and Communion and encouraged personal and corporate holiness.

The Oxford Movement was enormously influential. Throughout England, priests began venerating the bread and wine, wearing vestments and even using lighted candles on church altars—all perfectly standard practices today, but greeted with widespread horror and outrage in the 1840s and 1850s. Priests found themselves prosecuted for teaching the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and their churches were wrecked by rampaging mobs desperate to eradicate all traces of "popery" and "romishness." But the movement was too strong to be set back by such minor matters. By the time Pusey died in 1882, the Church of England had been transformed. Ritual, liturgy, mystery, devotion and beauty remain central to its thought and practice today.



[Excerpt from Jonathan Hill, The History of Christian Thought (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2003