Ecclesiology in the Church of England: an Historical and Theological Examination of the Role of Ecclesiology in the Church of England Since the Second World War

Durham E-Theses Ecclesiology in the Church of England: an historical and theological examination of the role of ecclesiology in the church of England since the second world war Bagshaw, Paul How to cite: Bagshaw, Paul (2000) Ecclesiology in the Church of England: an historical and theological examination of the role of ecclesiology in the church of England since the second world war, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/4258/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 Ecclesiology in the Church of England: an historical and theological examination of the role of ecclesiology in the Church of England since the Second World War The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should i)C published in any form, including; Electronic and the Internet, without the author's prior written consent. All information derived from this thesis must he acknowledged a|)propriatcly. Paul Bagshaw Submitted for the degree of M.Litt., March 2000 Contents page Abstract 1. Introduction 1 2. Theory and Methodology 7 3. The Apostolic Ministry and its critique 27 4. The Acquisition of Authority 84 5. Revision of the 1960s Settlement and 136 Ecclesiology in the Turnbull Report 6. The Role of Ecclesiology in the 166 Contemporary Church of England Bibliography 180 Ecclesiology in the Church of England an historical and theological examination of the role of ecclesiology in the Church of England since the Second World War Paul Bagshaw Submitted for the degree of M.Litt., March 2000 Abstract From a 'postliberal' perspective I argue that there is no means by which divine truth can incontrovertibly be known or directly understood and communicated. However a communitarian and historicist approach locates the experience and the expression of the engagement with God in the community of the church. The central problematic of ecclesiology is the discernment of authentic continuity with Jesus Christ in the context of churches which are divided, sinful, limited, and variously ordered. I have examined one strand of Anglo-Catholic ecclesiology as a case study of an attempt to assert a particular ecclesiology as true for the whole church. Second, I have traced the steps by which the Church of England gained legal authority over its central concerns of worship, doctrine and self-government, in order to sift out ecclesiological ideas implicit in its decision making. In these two chapters my focus has been to articulate an account of the idea of how God has been and should be made manifest in the structures and ordering of the Church of England. Third, I have evaluated the way ecclesiology has been deliberately used as an element of the legitimation of change in the church in particular in the Turnbull report. From these sources I have tried to extrapolate an overview of the actual role ecclesiology has played in the contemporary Church of England. I predict that ecclesiology will grow more significant in the Church of England, and that this will be beneficial, but to do so optimally it requires reinforcement with a stronger critical apparatus. I conclude that the determination of authentic continuity with Jesus Christ will not be found in the articulation and application of propositional divine truths, but in creative and dynamic engagement with God expressed and embodied in the community of the Church. Chapter 1 Introduction the structure had never been pulled down altogether and started again from the foundations, because, as with a medieval family mansion, they felt it had something about it, with its tradition and even its asymmetrical and inexact constitution, which they would be sorry to lose.'i Ecclesiology has not had a high standing in the Church of England^. Yet as the church progressively disentangles itself from subservience to the state, and as ecumenical discussion becomes more pervasive, it is probable that ecclesiology will gain a higher profile. This thesis will explore some of the roles that ecclesiology has played in the post• war Church of England. It will examine, in chapter 3, a particular strand of Anglo-Catholic ecclesiology, leading to the publication of Vie Apostolic Ministry^, 1 The Archdeacon of Wisbech describing patronage in an image which coidd equally have been apphed to the Churcli of England as a whole Church Assembly Report of Proceedings, (Vol. XXX, No. 3, Autumn 1950) p. 237. References will henceforth be to 'Proceedings', 'Journal' for the York Journal of Convocation; 'Chronicle' for the Chronicle of Convocation [Canterbury]; and General Synod Proceedings for the General Synod Report of Proceedings, with dates and page numbers. 21 suspect that a number of mutually reinforcing reasons have marginalised ecclesiology in the Church of Englemd. First, estabUsliment has been a substitute: a sufficient answer to the question 'what kind of church is the Church of England' has been, 'a Church by law Estabhshed'. Second, the potential of ecclesiological debate to define theological groimds of validation of the church imphed the probabihty of theological criteria by which to judge the poUtical settlement. Third, as a national church, the Church of England sought to avoid confessionaUsm with its implications of excluding the uncommitted and the danger of internal division. Fourth (in another meaning of 'national church') the complacent idea of the Church of England as quintessentially English was expressed not least in praise of pragmatism and suspicion of systematic theology. 3 K.E. Kirk (ed.), Tlie Apostolic Ministry, Essays on The History and The Doctrine of the Episcopacy, (London, Hodder and Stoughton, 1946; reprinted with a new Foreword by A.M. Farrer, 1957). and the debate which ensued. This chapter will focus primarily on hermeneutic questions examining both the theoretical claims of the theologians concerned, and their use of evidence to substantiate their ecclesiologies. Chapter 4 will trace some of the steps by which, between 1947 and 1974, the Church of England slowly expropriated from the state authority over its own affairs, especially in worship, doctrine, and self-government. The primary focus of this chapter will be on questions of the location, distribution and control of power and authority in the church. Chapter 5 will look briefly at elements of the revision of the settlement of the 1960s and 1970s and in more detail at the role of ecclesiology in the Turnbull report* and subsequent debate. Chapter 2 sets out the theoretical assumptions which inform this thesis, whilst the final chapter seeks to draw these threads together, and to suggest ways in which the role of ecclesiology in the Church of England might be enhanced. The starting point of this thesis is the perception that, in the period since the second World War, the Church of England has undergone a sea-change in its structures, its place in the nation, and in its self-perception. At the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II the Church of England stood at the zenith of its post-war self- assurance and its standing in the nation. The event undoubtedly brought together the Church of England, the monarchy, and the nation in an act of sacralization, witnessed for the first time by a television audience numbered in millions.'^ Archbishop Fisher received a standing ovation at the following meeting of the Church Assembly. The church was strong, purposeful, relatively united, and appeared to have settled itself securely into the reconstruction of post-war Britain. 4 Working as One Body, The Report of the Archbishops' Commission on the Organisation of the Church of England, [The Turnbull Report] (London, Church House Publishing, 1995). 5 G. Davie, Religion in Britain since 1945 - Believing loithout Belonging (Oxford, Blackwell, 1994) p. 31. By the end of the 1950s there was an audible rumbling of nascent storms. Some of the writing surrounding the Lambeth Conference in 1958 was critical of the church^. But these were straws in the wind. The 1960s began with great optimism for constructive change in the Church and a correlated fear of apparently inevitable change. The decade was in fact marked by a drastic loss of adherents of the Church of England and a parallel collapse in its public standing^ from both of which it has never recovered. From its negotiations with the state a new settlement emerged in which the Church of England became a little more distinct from both state and nation. It gained control over more of its affairs, discovered a greater variety of worship, and continued to use legislation to control its affairs, albeit that this was sometimes at odds with a more pastoral ethos amongst the clergy. At the start of the twenty-first century there is an amorphous sense that the Church of England is a new creation, but that it lacks confidence as to the shape, direction, or potential it might or should have. 'Like Britain, only much later in the twentieth century and on into the twenty-first, the Church of England has to struggle with the unwelcome genie from the bottle of a different self-knowledge, the discovery that it may not be quite what, or who, it used to think it was.'^ In the context of a changing Church of England I had initially assumed that ecclesiology might provide a theological beacon, illuminating the identity of the 6 Dai-iiel Jenkins identified several books published before the Lambeth Conference of 1958, all of wliich had a 'note of self-criticism'.

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