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175th
ANNIVERSARY OF THE OXFORD MOVEMENT
14 July 2008
In 1833 the Church of England was startled by the Oxford Movement. The
spark which ignited this powerful religious reawakening was the proposal
of the Whig government to suppress half the Anglican bishoprics in
Ireland and to re-dispose their incomes, without first consulting the
Church. A group of clerical dons at Oxford, of whom John Keble, John
Henry Newman, Richard Hurrell Froude and Edward Bouverie Pusey are the
most well-known, took grave exception to the Whigs’ proposals. They
believed that the Church is a divinely-founded society, with Jesus
Christ at its head, and that its reform was nothing to do with a secular
Parliament. Their campaign of opposition was inaugurated with an assize
sermon preached by Keble in the university church of St Mary in Oxford
on 14 July 1833, in which he called Whig government’s planned
legislation ‘National Apostasy.’ The Oxford dons next wrote a series of
Tracts for the Times, examining aspects of the theological crisis
created by the government’s action, which they had delivered to every
parsonage in England.
The Church of England, they taught, has passed through the
Reformation, but it is not simply of the Reformation. It is not a
Protestant Church (the word Protestant never appears in the
Prayer Book, nor in any Anglican formularies), but it is a reformed
catholic Church, a subtle but significant difference. The Church of
England is the historic catholic and apostolic Church of this land. It
is part of the wider Church of Christ – a claim made on the title page
of the 1662 Prayer Book – cleansed of medieval abuses and unscriptural
accretions in the sixteenth century, but in all other respects in
continuity with what went before. They pointed out that the Church of
England has retained the historic three-fold ministry of bishop, priest
and deacon; her bishops are part of the Apostolic Succession; her
priests by their episcopal ordination are identifiable with Roman
Catholic and Eastern Orthodox priests, and exercise the same priesthood;
through them, her faithful are assured of a valid sacramental ministry.
The leaders of the Oxford Movement were highly intellectual and very
serious men. They believed the Church of England to be under threat, and
they sought to raise the whole tone of her life and witness. For them,
what mattered above all else was personal and corporate holiness;
and, because holiness may only grow upon a foundation of truth, they
were especially concerned with doctrinal purity and theological
orthodoxy.
The Oxford Movement teaches us that all truth ultimately comes from God:
Jesus Christ himself said “I am the way, the truth and the life.”
Christian truth does not depend for its validity upon the opinions of
individual Christians at any one time. Something is true simply because
God makes it true and reveals it to us, and for no other reason. If all
Christians decided to reject some aspect of Christianity, this aspect
would not thereby become untrue because of their rejection of it. Nor,
if all Christians decided to believe in something new or decided to
amend some old aspect of Christianity, would it therefore suddenly
become true because of their new belief. God does not – indeed, He
cannot – contradict Himself. Christian doctrine and moral teaching that
were true in 33 A.D. and 1833 A.D., remain true in 2008 A.D. They cannot
have become false by by reason of their contradicting current values and
ideas, and because some people find them difficult.
The Oxford Movement did not go unchallenged, but it proved to be the
most important religious reawakening in England during the nineteenth
century. The renaissance of spirituality, theology, scholarship,
liturgy, music, art, architecture, and the revival of religious orders
and communities (monks and nuns), which the Oxford Movement began in the
Church of England goes under the name of the Catholic Revival. To
this day in the early twenty-first century, there is not a parish church
in the Anglican Communion that has not been affected by it in some way
or other.
On 14 July 2008, the 175th anniversary of John Keble’s Assize
sermon, Anglicans throughout the world will observe an hour of silent
prayer. We will give thanks for the rich inheritance of the Oxford
Movement. We will also pray for the future, seeking to discover God’s
will and fulfil His purposes for us in our own lives, churches and
communities. We warmly invite you to hold an hour of silent prayer in
your own church or to join one being held in a church near you. Please
register your church’s hour of silent prayer on
www.oxfordmovement.org.uk
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