Bishop Hugh Latimer (1485-1555)

O GOD, whose never-failing providence ordereth all things both in heaven and earth; We humbly beseech thee to put away from us all hurtful things, and to give us those things which be profitable for us; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Eighth Sunday After Trinity

This week’s Collect echoes the Lord’s Prayer,

LEAD us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

Hugh Latimer (1485-1555), Bishop of Worcester, explained why we must pray so, and not simply labour to be obedient:

THIS petition, “Lead us not into temptation,” the meaning of it is, Almighty God, we desire thy holy majesty for to stand by and with us, with thy Holy Spirit, so that temptation overcome us not, but that we, through thy goodness and help, may vanquish and get the victory over it; for it is not in our power to do it: thou, O God, must help us to strive and fight.

It is with this petition, “Lead us not into temptation,” even as much as St. Paul saith, Ne regnet igitur peccatum in vestro mortali corpore, “Let not sin reign in your corruptible body,” saith St. Paul: He doth not require that we shall have no sin, for that is impossible unto us; but he requireth that we be not servants unto sin, that we give not place unto it, that sin rule not in us.

And this is a commandment, we are commanded to forsake and hate sin, so that it may have no power over us.

Now we shall turn this commandment into a prayer, and desire of God that he will keep us, that he will not lead us into temptation; that is to say, that he will not suffer sin to have the rule and governance over us, and so we shall say with the prophet, Domine dirige gressus meos, “Lord, rule and govern thou me in the right way.”

And so we shall turn God’s commandment into a prayer, to desire of him help to do his will and pleasure; like as St. Augustine saith, Da quod jubes, et jube quod vis, “Give that thou commandest, and then command what thou wilt.” As who say, if thou wilt command only and not give, then we shall be lost, we shall perish.

Therefore we must desire him to rule and govern all our thoughts, words, acts, and deeds, so that no sins bear rule in us; we must require him to put his helping hand to us, that we may overcome temptation, and not temptation us.

This I would have you to consider, that every morning when you rise from your bed, you would say these words with a faithful heart and earnest mind: Domine, gressus meos, dirige ne dominetur peccatum in meo mortali corpore. ”Lord, rule and govern me so, order my ways so, that sin get not the victory of me, that sin rule me not, but let thy Holy Ghost inhabit my heart.”

The Seventh Sermon Upon The Lord’s Prayer

See more by Hugh Latimer.

Edward Reynolds (1599-1676), Bishop of Norwich

TODAY’S second reading at Mattins (Acts 28:17-31) finds St Paul announcing once again God’s plan to bring the Gentiles into the privileges once reserved for the elect nation of Israel, according to his purpose from before the foundation of the world.

BE it known therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it.

For Edward Reynolds (1599-1676), Bishop of Norwich, the gospel is “the salvation of God” because it is the very presence of Christ, especially in the ‘ordinances’ of the Church, i.e. the evangelical celebration of the sacraments.

WE know, that Christ was crucified at Jerusalem; and yet the apostle saith, that he was crucified amongst the Galatians (Gal 3:1).

Certainly, “in that he died, he died but once, unto sin.” St. Paul could not do that himself, which he curseth others for doing, “Crucify again the Lord of glory” (1 Cor 2:8)

So then at Jerusalem he was crucified in his person, and, at Galatia, in the ministry of his word.

One and the same crucifying, was lively set forth in St. Paul’s preaching, as it was really acted upon Christ’s person: for Christ is as really present to his church now in the spiritual dispensation of his ordinances, as he was corporally present with the Jews in the days of his flesh. [...]

“Be it known unto you,” saith the apostle (Acts 28:28) to the unbelieving Jews, “that the salvation of God,” that is, the gospel of God (as appeareth plainly by the like parallel speech in another place (Acts 13:46) “is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it.”

So the apostle saith (Jas 1:21), that “the engrafted word is able to save the souls of men.”

All which, and many other the like particulars note unto us, that as Christ is the power and image of his Father, so the gospel is in some sort of Christ.

For which reason the apostle, as I conceive, calleth the gospel, “the face of Jesus Christ:” — “God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 4:6).

Where is it that we behold “the glory of God but in a glass” (2 Cor 3:18)? and what is that glass, but “the word of God,” as St. James calls it? (Jas 1:23)

Christ is not pleased any other ways ordinarily to exercise his power, or to reveal his glory, but in these ordinances of his which we dispense.

An Exposition Of The One Hundred And Tenth Psalm. Verse IV.

OUR first Psalm at Evening Prayer today (Psalm 142) exhorts us to bring our troubles and sorrows to God’s throne.

Psalm 142:1-2

James Ussher (1581-1656), Archbishop of Armagh, rightly understood that Evensong corresponds to the evening sacrifice of the Temple, and so he cast our prayers in terms of pleading Christ’s sacrifice before heaven, offering our remembrance of his death like calves upon the altar.

AS soon as I apprehend my need, and see the golden sceptre stretched out, then I come with might and main with Christ in my arms, and present him to the Father, and this is the approaching and drawing near in the text, to the throne of grace.

But now when I am come thither, what do I say there? What, shall I come and say nothing? The prodigal son resolved to go to his father, and say, “I will up and go,” there is the will; “and say,” there is his speech (see Lk 15:11-32).

The believer is not like to the son that said to his father, I will go, but went not; and when his father bids him come, he will come; he will not only say so, but will draw near, and then he hath a promise: “He that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out” (Jn 6:37).

But when we come thither, what must we do? why we must take unto ourselves words, according to the prophet’s expression: “Take unto you words, and go unto the Lord, and say, Take away all our iniquities, and receive us graciously, so will we render the calves of our lips” (Hos 14:2; cf. Heb 9:11-12).

When he comes to the throne of grace, the thing that he doth, is, he presents unto the Father Christ, bleeding, gasping, dying, buried, and conquering death; and when he presents Christ to him, he opens his case, and confesses his sin to the full, and says, Lord, this is my case. [...]

A beggar’s need will make him speak, and he will not hide his sores; but if he hath any sore more ugly or worse than another, he will uncover it; Good sir, behold my woful and distressed case, he lays all open to provoke pity.

So, when thou comest before God in confession, canst thou not find out words to open thyself to Almighty God, not one word whereby thou mayest unlap thy sores, and beseech him to look on thee with an eye of pity? I must not mince my sins, but amplify and aggravate them, that God may be moved to pardon me; till we do thus, we cannot expect that God should forgive us.

Works, Vol. XIII (Sermons). Sermon XIV

See more by Archbishop Ussher.

John Bird Sumner (1780-1862)

THE Gospel reading this week (The Eighth Sunday After Trinity) is a warning against “false prophets” (Mt 7:15-21).

BEWARE of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits.

Writing about this passage, John Bird Sumner (1780-1862), Archbishop of Canterbury, reminded us that it is only wisdom from above that will bear good fruit in our lives.

THEY come in sheep’s clothing. They profess that they seek the welfare of the flock, and that the welfare of the flock depends solely on themselves.

But inwardly they are ravening wolves; “not sparing the flock;” (Acts 20:29) “teachers of what they ought not, for filthy lucre’s sake;” (Tit 1:11) “through covetousness by feigned words, making merchandize of others.” (2 Pet 2:3)

They “say, Peace, peace; when there is no peace:” (Jer 6:14) or they make “the heart of the righteous sad, which God has not made sad.” (Ezek 13:22) In various ways they “subvert the hearers,” (2 Tim 2:14) whom they are bound to establish in the faith of Christ.

There is a rule, however, by which these and any other false teachers may be discerned. Ye shall know them by their fruits. The great purpose of our Lord’s coming, was to “redeem men from all iniquity, and to purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.” (Tit 2:14)

Every teacher that does not exhibit that character in himself, and study to produce it in others, is a false teacher.

Every doctrine which does not tend to promote individual righteousness and holiness, is false doctrine.

Therefore by their fruits ye shall know them. Grapes may as reasonably be expected from thorns, as a good life from unsound doctrine; figs may as well be sought from thistles, as the work of an effective ministry from a corrupt teacher.

“He that winneth souls,” (Prov 11:30) must himself be first won by “the wisdom which is from above.” (Jas 3:17)

A Practical Exposition Of The Gospels Of St Matthew And St Mark. Lecture XVI.

Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667)

TODAY we commemorate St Anne, mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Traditions surrounding Mary’s birth and parents have come down to us from the so-called Protevangelium of James, which dates from around the middle of the second century AD, and in which we hear for the first time the names Joachim and Anna (Anne).

Rarely referred to in the English Reformers’ “golden era” of the first six centuries of the Church Fathers, it was regarded with a degree of suspicion (e.g. St Augustine, 354-430, Contra Faustum Bk XXIII §9).

Chastened by the flights of fancy in late Mediaeval speculation, few Anglican Divines set much store by these accounts either, save for the names Joachim and Anna.

It is, perhaps, a day for musing on parenthood, in which we must suppose Joachim and Anna were proficient.

In the following passage, Bishop Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667) speaks of the supreme importance of inculcating Christian principles by gaining a child’s trust.

“FATHERS, provoke not your children to wrath” (Eph 6:4): that is, be tender-bowelled, pitiful, and gentle, complying with all the infirmities of the children, and in their several ages proportioning to them several usages, according to their needs and their capacities.

“Bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord:” that is, secure their religion; season their younger years with prudent and pious principles; make them in love with virtue; and make them habitually so, before they come to choose or to discern good from evil, that their choice may be with less difficulty and danger: for while they are under discipline, they suck in all that they are first taught, and believe it infinitely.

Provide for them wise, learned, and virtuous tutors, and good company and discipline, seasonable baptism, catechism, and confirmation. For it is a great folly to heap up much wealth for our children, and not to take care concerning the children for whom we get it; it is as if a man should take more care about his shoe than about his foot.

“Parents must shew piety at home” (Heb 12:9); that is, they must give good example and reverend deportment in the face of their children; and all those instances of charity, which usually endear each other, — sweetness of conversation, affability, frequent admonitions, all significations of love and tenderness, care and watchfulness, — must be expressed towards children, that they may look upon their parents as their friends and patrons, their defence and sanctuary, their treasure and their guide.

The Rule And Exercises Of Holy Living, Chap. III §2.

Margaret Thatcher (1925-)

ROWAN Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, has once again criticised Margaret Thatcher’s statement that “there’s no such thing as society” (Telegraph).

It is, of course, fully twenty years since Mrs Thatcher was in power. Thirteen of those years have been under a socialist government.

By any measure, society is less free, cohesive and equitable, and significantly less Christian, than ever.

Yet Dr Williams repeatedly comes back to Mrs Thatcher’s famous line. This time, he even called it “toxic”.

What Mrs Thatcher actually said, in an interview with lifestyle magazine Woman’s Own in 1987, was this:

IF children have a problem, [people say] it is “society” that is at fault. There is no such thing as “society”. There is [a] living tapestry of men and women and people, and the beauty of that tapestry, and the quality of our lives, will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves, and each of us prepared to turn round and help, by our own efforts, those who are unfortunate.

Visit The Margaret Thatcher Foundation for the full text.

Now, if this is “toxic”, the New Testament is toxic, because this is exactly what it teaches.

Dr Williams asserted, apparently unware of how cold and manufactured it sounds, that “The role of government is building connections between people and communities and making them work”.

The governments in both Jerusalem and Rome loudly claimed to do just that, yet not one single verse in the New Testament looks to them to perform or even facilitate this role. Indeed, St Paul warned the Christians of Thessalonica against being taken in by Rome’s “peace and security” propaganda (1 Thess 5:3).

In passage after passage, “building connections” and providing for the less fortunate was the task of unregulated, private Christian individuals, families, and above all parishes.

They did not need, ask, or expect help of the Emperor – they knew what a price he would extort in return.

POSSIBLY it may seem a good reason to some, for their own neglect of the poor, that the law makes provision for them.

And it is certainly an honour to the law, that it doth: but no honour to us, that it needs do it.

Besides, there are very many cases of great distress, to which legal provision is neither easily nor properly extended: nor can it give by any means so plentiful relief, as should be given to the greater part of those, to whom it may extend.

But suppose the law capable of doing every thing that needs be done: what would be the consequence of leaving every thing to it? That we should lose intirely the means, which now we have, of proving to the world, and to ourselves, the goodness of our own hearts; and of making an undoubted free-will offering to God, out of what he hath given us.

Thomas Secker (1693-1768), Archbishop of Canterbury.
Sermon IV. Preached in the Parish Church of St Bridget, London, Monday in Easter Week, 1738.

Richard Mant (1776-1848), Bishop of Down, Connor And Dromore

IN our Gospel for the Feast of St James today, we hear how Salome, the mother of St John the Evangelist and St James, stepped forward to ask that in Jesus’s kingdom, her two sons might have favoured places (Mt 20:20-23).

Though John was “the beloved disciple”, Jesus nevertheless replied to her,

TO sit on my right hand and on my left is not mine to give, but it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared of my Father.

Bishop Richard Mant (1776-1848) explained to us in what sense this gift was and yet was not Christ’s to give, and who they are for whom such pre-eminence in the kingdom of heaven has been prepared by our Father.

AS if he had said, Such pre-eminence in my kingdom “is not mine to give,” as you fondly suppose, by any absolute will of mine, or by any arbitrary selection of objects; by any undue partiality or fondness for the persons to be admitted; or out of any undue compliance with the earnest solicitations of others: “but” these rewards are regulated by the counsels of divine wisdom, which pervade the dispensation whereof I am the Mediator; and accordingly, in the execution of my mediatorial office, it is mine to give it unto them “for whom it is prepared of my Father.”

Now, who are they, for whom future blessedness and glory are “prepared of his Father,” he has not left us to conjecture, but has elsewhere graciously informed us.

They are they who love God: for “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him” (1 Cor 2:9).

They are they who love their brethren, the brethren of Christ as he is not ashamed to call them, and practise towards them the offices of benevolence and love: for this shall be the language addressed to them by the King, the Son of man, when he shall sit upon the throne of his glory, and all nations shall be gathered before him; “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me” (Mt 25:34, 40).

They are they, who on their passage through this terrestrial scene confess by their conduct that “they are strangers and pilgrims on the earth,” and “desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for he hath prepared for them a city” (Heb 11:13, 16).

The Happiness Of The Blessed &c — Section IV: Principle On Which Higher Degrees Of Happiness Will Be Bestowed

The Crown Of Thorns, by Carl Heinrich Bloch (1834-1890)

YESTERDAY, we saw how in our common prayer we present to God the life and Passion of Christ, doing upon earth what Christ does evermore in heaven.

On that occasion, we heard from St Anselm, Bishop Andrewes, and Bishop Taylor. Here now is a more recent writer on the same subject, showing movingly the unbroken golden thread of catholic faith that runs through the English Church.

O HOW little have I said of the Passion, when the whole world might be filled with It, when all eternity will be full of It, when, in all eternity, we shall never weary of admiring, thanking, adoring It!

Shall we perhaps know more and more of It throughout eternity and love It more? I cannot but think that we shall, if through Its precious merits we attain thither.

Our’s will be no mere reflection upon It; we shall ever see It: for we shall for ever see the prints of the nails in the glorified Body of Jesus.

Yes, this is an addition to the condescension of His Passion; this is part of the mystery of His love, that the Passion lives on there eternally. Perseverance is our highest conception of love; we are so changeable, so unpersevering! The Passion lives on in Heaven: it lives on upon earth in the Sacraments. [...]

His Presence intercedes; the Wounds, which for us He endured, intercede. He intercedes as our High Priest. How did the High Priest intercede? By presenting the blood of the sacrifice. Jesus intercedes then by presenting Himself.

Yet this is again another condescension of the love of our God. He wills not, that the memory of the contumely and contempt, which He endured for us, should fade or pass away. It is part of the continual outstretched contemplation of the blessed Angels. We know that the prints of the nails, and the spear-pierced Side, are, as they were, in glory.

For the Angel said to the Apostles, that “this Jesus, Who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.”

But He went with those prints of the nails, into which St. Thomas put his fingers, and that wound in the Side into which he was bid to thrust his hand. Well then may we think, that there are the traces of the Crown of thorns, the punctures in the Forehead through which they pierced Him, and perhaps the wales of the scourges.

There they are, but in what glory! All creation, to its utmost bounds, adores the condescension of its God. But the love of that condescension was for us.

The Revd E. B. Pusey (1800-1882). Eleven Addresses During A Retreat Of The Companions Of The Love Of Jesus. Address VI.

Christ on the cross (14th century)

THE Litany sets on our lips a series of moving invocations of Christ’s birth and Passion.

BY the mystery of thy holy Incarnation; by thy holy Nativity and Circumcision; by thy Baptism, Fasting, and Temptation,
Good Lord, deliver us.

By thine Agony and Bloody Sweat; by thy Cross and Passion; by thy precious Death and Burial; by thy glorious Resurrection and Ascension, and by the Coming of the Holy Ghost,
Good Lord, deliver us.

These Obsecrations (Lat. obsecro, lit. “ask on religious grounds”, “entreat”) were objected to by the Calvinist party right from the start, with John Knox (?1513-1572) complaining to Geneva about “a certain conjuring of God” in the Litany within the Prayer Book of 1552.

Yet these same prayers were to be found in Martin Luther’s Litany. The 15th century Golden Litany (here) was on this model, and much earlier St Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) wrote his Prayer XV (extract) as a litany.

O MOST loving and sweetest Lord Jesu, by Thy holy Annunciation, have mercy upon my unhappy soul. [...]
O most Sweet Lord Jesu, by Thy Scourgings, Spittings, Blows, which for us Thou didst receive,
O most Sweet Lord Jesu, by the Crown of Thorns which Thou didst bear upon Thy Head, that Thou mightest take away the thorns of our sins,
O most Sweet Lord Jesu, by Thy Cross, and the Death which on that Cross Thou didst suffer, that Thou mightest redeem us from death, …

The title Bishop Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626) gave to a similar prayer in his Devotions (here) explains everything: An Eucharistic Prayer.

BY the things which Thou didst, and bearest,
Thy Oblation and Sacrifice,
Thy emptying Thyself, Thy humbling Thyself,
Thy Incarnation, Thy Conception, Thy Birth,
Thy Circumcision, the first-fruits of Thy Blood,
Thy Baptism, Thy Fasting, Thy Temptation,
Thy Houselessness, Thy Hunger,
Thy Weariness, Thy Thirst,
Thy Sleeplessness, Thy Injuries:
Thy patience, endurance, Thy apprehension as a thief, bonds,
By Gethsemane, Gabbatha, Golgotha,
Thy obedience unto Death, Thy endurance to the Cross:
Let my prayer ascend; Turn not away Thine Ear.

All prayer is essentially Eucharistic, when it does not merely acknowledge but holds up before God a remembrance of the life of Christ to God, just as Christ himself presents it evermore before his Father’s throne.

NOW what Christ does always in a proper and most glorious manner, the ministers of the gospel also do in theirs; commemorating the sacrifice upon the cross, “giving thanks,” and celebrating a perpetual eucharist for it, and “by declaring the death of Christ,” and praying to God in the virtue of it, for all the members of the church, and all persons capable; it is in genere orationis, a sacrifice, and an instrument of propitiation, as all holy prayers are in their several proportions.

Bishop Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667). The Divine Institution Of The Office Ministerial, §V.1-2

See Introduction to the Litany, by the Revd William Bright D.D. (1824-1901).

George Hickes (1642-1715), Dean of Worcester

IN a previous post, we heard from Jane Austen (1775-1817) on the importance of clergy “as the guardianship of religion and morals, and consequently of the manners which result from their influence”.

We heard also from Canon Carter, on the unique dignity of a priest as “a necessary link in the chainwork of the Divine purposes”, and from George Hickes (1642-1715), urging us not to jettison words like “priest” and “sacerdotal” in hasty fear of erroneous doctrines such as those condemned in Article XXXI, but to bring them back to the evangelical doctrine of the Fathers.

Underlying Dean Hickes’s comments was a widespread experience (see e.g. Bishop Hall), that parties opposed to the catholic doctrine of priesthood were associated with a secularisation of worship and morals.

AS long as the People are taught the true Nature of the Christian Ministry, to be, as really it is, a true and proper Priesthood, and that their Ministers are true, and proper Priests ordained by God to stand before him as Advocates for them, and before them for him as his Oracles to bless them in his Name, so long they will honour, and reverence them, as Priests; but when they are pleased to strip themselves of that part of their Character, and Relation to God, to which those Powers belong, and which above any other makes their Ministry, and them, as Church Ministers, venerable, and holy, then they’ll soon find the Veneration of the People begin to decay, and by degrees wear off into utter Contempt, when they have once laid aside the Notion of their being Orators, and Advocates ordained by God to intercede with him for them; which, Sir, their Flocks can no longer retain, than they believe them to be proper Priests. [...]

BUT neither are these, Sir, all the ill Consequences of this Doctrine, which must also tempt Clergymen themselves, who believe it, to have a lower, and meaner Idea of their Ministry, and not to think their Order to be of that Dignity, and Holiness; and so separate from the World, as it is, and the ancient Christians believed it to be.

They cannot have that Honour, and Reverence for it, as they themselves ought to have, if they do not believe it to be a true Priesthood, nor will they distinguish themselves so carefully, as it becomes Ministers of Christ, from other Men by the singular Piety of their Lives, and the Gravity of their Garb, and Behaviour, if they do not believe themselves to be Priests; I doubt nor, Sir, but that their Latitude of Opinion in this point is one of the Reasons, why so many Ministers of late are more than ever secularised in their Conversation, and without Reverence to them selves, conform themselves, and Families, to the sinful Fashions, and Vanities of the World, against which they ought to preach with one Mouth, and with the Zeal of a Cyprian, a Basil, a Gregory, an Ambrose, or Chrysostom, lift up their Voices, like Trumpets, and not spare the greatest of Men.

Christian Priesthood Asserted. Chapter III.