A Field Guide to the English Clergy: A Compendium of Diverse Eccentrics, Pirates, Prelates and Adventurers; All Anglican, Some Even Practising by fergus butler-gallie oneworld, 192 pages, $20 Ah, the holy fool. Though we often associate such characters with the great tomes of Russian . . . . Continue Reading »
Thomas Cromwell: A Revolutionary Life by diarmaid macculloch viking, 752 pages, $40 They said it could not be done. At least Sir Geoffrey Elton, to whose memory his former doctoral student has dedicated this book, said it could not be done. According to him, as Diarmaid MacCulloch reminds us, . . . . Continue Reading »
Hidden in the northern suburbs of Oxford are the last traces of a path first trodden by multitudes of country folk hurrying to see the burning of the Protestant martyrs Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley on October 16, 1555, and trudging home afterward. For some years I lived very close to this track, . . . . Continue Reading »
Yes, I remember the Church of England, much more than a name, a living thing. As it happens, my own religiously confused family was not churchgoing. By the early 1950s, most of the respectable English middle class had ceased to be especially religious, though they continued to respect faith. Church . . . . Continue Reading »
While Stephen Sizer has shown himself ready to apologize, he has been unwilling to alter his behavior. It is past time for his church to stop allowing him to plead carelessness as his excuse. Continue Reading »
The Church of England should carefully considering the consequences for Middle Eastern Christians and Jews of a conference like the one the Vicar of Christ Church attended in Tehran Continue Reading »
On August 5, 2003, the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church USA (ECUSA), following initial action by the House of Deputies of ECUSA’s General Convention, gave its consent (by a ratio of roughly 60-40) to the election of the Reverend V. Gene Robinson to become the next Bishop of the Episcopal . . . . Continue Reading »