🧵 Anglican theology of “facing towards the East” (“ad orientem”)

-which way have Anglican ministers historically faced during the Divine Service?
-what theology underpins this?
-are there statistics that demonstrate the common practice?

Let’s explore 👇

Image source: Thomas Cranmer, “Catechismus” (1548)
At the English Reformation, Anglican clerics celebrated the Divine Service facing eastward (see images above). This was in common with the Lutheran and medieval practice.

Lutheran Medieval

🧵 Early Modern Depictions of Anglican Clergy

For a variety of reasons, early modern depictions of Anglican clergy are not well-known online, or even in the scholarship itself(!). It is truly a drought out there.

Let’s fill it in👇 1535 Coverdale Bible
bibles-online.net/1535/

🧵Prayers for Faithful Departed

-key spiritual practice, rooted in the 1552 Prayerbook
-embodies the “Communion of Saints”
-connects the living & the dead into one
-purged of any links w/ Purgatory
-avoids continental Protestant mistakes

—

Image: “The Judde Memorial” (1560). Wikimedia Commons. Did you know that the 1552 BCP, and other official texts, contain prayers for the dead?

How did the faithful use this practice, in the absence of Purgatory?

What does its omission from recent books on Anglicanism say about the reliability of modern scholarship?

Let’s dive in👇

🧵Roman Catholic doctrine on Holy Orders

-one of worst corruptions in church history
-priests allowed to do ordinations; bishops just a bonus
-presbyterianism w/ a Pope; inspiration for Calvin etc
-in 20th c. quietly changed and covered up, like it never existed What’s missing from the above diagram of holy orders? The BISHOP!

How did it happen that scenes like the one below became a normal part of the Middle Ages?

Let’s find out-

🧵Does Roman Catholicism “follow the Church Fathers”?

This is a common meme, grounded in the notion that at least the RCs are “more patristic” than tshirt-wearing smoke-&-mirrors US evangelicals.

Which, true enough. But they fall off, beyond that lowest of bars.

Let’s explore: Table of Conftents:

1. Nature of a Sacrament
2. Icons, Images, & Apostolic Piety
3. Mary
4. Purgatory
5. “Development of Doctrine”
6. “The Chair of Peter”
7. Papacy (as defined by Vatican I)
8. “Aerian Heresy”

🧵The Anglican Doctrine of Justification

-righteousness is not only imputed, but infused (ie. transforms us)
-we’re not only reckoned but actually BECOME righteous

Let’s take a look 👇 Homily of Salvation

-“no man by his own acts [can] be justified, and MADE righteous before God”
-“What is the true and justifying faith[:] not only to believe that holy Scripture, … but also to have a sure TRUST and confidence in God’s merciful promises, … whereof doth follow a LOVING heart to obey his commandments”
-“[Faith moves] us to render our selves unto God wholly with all our WILL, HEARTS, MIGHT, and POWER, to serve him in all good deeds, obeying his commandments during our lives”

Homily on the True and Lively Faith

-“true, liuely, and Christian faith, is … a thing of perfect vertue, of wonderfull operation or working, and strength, bringing foorth all good motions, and good workes.”anglicanlibrary.org/homilies/bk1ho…

🧵Baptismal Regeneration
-an Anglican vs. Reformed debate

After the emergence of the Reformed/Calvinistic tradition in the 17th c., its theologians significantly departed from the orthodox and catholic position on Baptismal Regeneration, one that has been maintained by Anglicans and other historic church bodies for thousands of years down to antiquity. (On the equivocal and unstable meaning of the term “Reformed”, see this thread:

https://twitter.com/anglican_net/status/1547561056733503489

“English Liberty”

-a unique concept, unprecedented in world history
-a thousand-years old tradition focusing on individual liberty and justice
-derives from ancient English traditions of personal rights and duties
-enshrines the liberties & sanctity of individual, contrasted… https://t.co/plhMJa3bhKtwitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Jordan Peterson, “Why I Love Great Britain”
-The freedoms Britain granted the world are the most precious gift of all. We must preserve them
-That gift is the political expression of the sanctification of the word — freedom in speech, imagination and thought: freedom to engage in… https://t.co/R8AZmjW4Thtwitter.com/i/web/status/1…

https://twitter.com/stephenblackwd/status/1478551369313357825

🧵Theology of the Anglo-Saxon Church of England.

It’s a less-known fact that the 1066 AD Norman Conquest also led to the Papacy taking over the Church of England. Before that time, under the Anglo-Saxons like King Alfred the Great, the Church of England significantly differed from the doctrines being promoted by the medieval Papacy.

Let’s take a look:
👇 1. The Eucharist

The eucharistic doctrine of Aelfric, a 10th c. Abbot of Eynsham, was widely seen as the post-Reformation doctrine of the Church of England.

Archbishop Matthew Parker had this published: “A Testimony of Antiquity; showing the ancient faith in the Church of England touching the sacrament of the body and blood of the Lord” (1567)
books.google.com/books?id=wfliA…

Richard Hooker on the theology of ordination and holy orders. From his “𝐿𝑎𝑤𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝐸𝑐𝑐𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑙 𝑃𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑦” Book V (1597)

A 🧵 . Book 5, chapter 77. “Of the power given unto men to execute that heavenly office; of the gift of the holy Ghost in ordination”
oll.libertyfund.org/index.php?opti…

-1. The Call from God
-2. Separation from the Laity
-3. Fatherly Guides
-4. Indelible Change in Ordination
-5. The Power
-Bonus:… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…

Anglican mystical theology of the East.

"For as the lightnyng commeth out of the east, and appeareth into the West, so shall the commyng of the sonne of man be."
-Matthew 24:27

A 🧵. Richard Smith, A brief treatyse settynge forth diuers truthes (1547)
-“We pray toward the east, not by chance but because God is light that may be understood and the sun of righteousness, & Christ is called ‘oriens’. The east must be dedicated to him for worshipping of him”

In honour of Commonwealth Day, here are the top 20 most rousing and heroic British Empire films ever made. Watch these one a day, make it an empire month. Top one:

1) The Four Feathers (1939)

One of the great 16c. questions is the inspiration for post-Reformation Anglican view of Eucharist.

In this🧵we trace it to Ratramnus of Corbey (868AD) and Aelfric of Eynsham (955AD), great medieval opponents of Romish transubstantiation (& thru them directly to Church Fathers). 1. "the Doctrine of Ratramnus was the very same Doctrine which the Church of England embraced, as most consonant to Scripture and the Fathers"
-1688 English ed. of Ratramnus: books.google.com/books?id=ZshBA…

A 🧵on the unexpected emergence of atheism in Elizabethan England, after the Reformation.

👇

/1 Concerns w/ Late Medieval piety leading to paganism, idolatry and superstition are well known. Less known is the opposite: disappearance of religion as such, in parts of Elizabethan England. It isn’t well known bc. the Anglican divines fixed it, through a series of reforms.

/2

Adam Hill, The defence of the article: Christ descended into Hell With arguments obiected against the truth of the same doctrine (1592)

books.google.com/books?id=SXVmA…

A 🧵 on Christ’s Descent in the English Reformation👇

/1 The “descensus” clause in the Creed formed of of several flashpoints between the orthodox Anglican Divines, and dissenters. Divorce, liturgy, episcopacy, and the sacraments and rites of the Church being others.

/2

Penance: the forgotten Anglican doctrine.

++Thomas Cranmer: “as by baptism we are born again, and as by the authority of the keys & Penance, we are lifted up again when fallen into sin after Baptism, so by the communion of the Holy Supper, we are preserved & strengthened”

/1 Article 33: “The person which by open denounciation of the Church is cut-off from the unity of the Church, & Excommunicated, ought to be taken from the multitude of the faithful, as an heathen & Publican, until he be openly reconciled by Penance, and received into the Church”

/2