July 2007

Parish History Episode 75- The Cranmerian Parish

In last month's article, we saw how Thomas Cromwell, on behalf of his master, King Henry VIII, had attempted to transform the parishes of England into effective instruments of local government, and had arranged for them to keep all sorts of vital statistics, reigning to the birth, life and death of their inhabitants, and to the ownership and use of land within the parish. Over each such parish, two churchwardens, elected by the men of property within the parish, were to rule as joint magistrates, like the two kings who had once jointly ruled ancient Sparta.

The churchwardens did not, however, possess any jurisdiction over church services. The parish priest alone was responsible there. If he did not perform his duties adequately, he was answerable, of course, to God; but, more immediately, to the rural dean, the archdeacon, the bishop, and the archbishop. Houghton-le-Spring was course in the Diocese of Durham, and the Province (Archbishopric) of York. But in the new Church of England, cast adrift now from the Roman obedience, the Archbishop of York counted for very little. The Archbishop of Canterbury, "Primate of All England', in direct contact with the King and Court in London (he normally resided in Lambeth Palace, a short walk from Westminster), in effect governed the Church of England as if it were a single Province.

The Archbishop of Canterbury had been, since 1532, Thomas Cranmer. Although he had been consecrated according to the traditional customs of the Latin Church, receiving the customary gift of a pallium (a sort of woollen stole traditionally worn by archbishops) from Pope Clement VII, he had peen excommunicated by Clement's successor, Paul III. Cranmer was certainly sympathetic to 'Reform', but was very cautious about pursing his ideas into practice. For instance, he had secretly married, though priests in England, as in the rest of the Latin Church, were still bound by a vow of celibacy. When "company' was expected at Lambeth Palace, his wife retired to the kitchen, sat with the maids, and pretended to be a servant.

This state of affairs was, no doubt, unknown in Houghton-le-Spring. What would people here have bean aware of, at this time? Were they even aware that they were entering into changes, which would later be described as the Reformation?

They knew of course of the King's four marriages, and of the differing fates of his four queens. They knew of the Dissolution of the Monasteries, and knew what had happened at Durham, Finchale and Monkwearmouth. Perhaps one or more former monks from Durham were now serving as curates here at Houghton. People knew of the Pilgrimage of Grace, and how savagely it had been repressed. They knew now that there were additional bureaucratic procedures to be entered into whenever a wedding, christening or funeral took place. But had they caught any of the fire and zeal which had inspired the Reformers?

Alternatively, had they felt the horror which had led the Pilgrims of Grace to turn out in their thousands, in protest against King Henry's tape of the monasteries? Apparently not, for nobody from Houghton seems to have joined the rebellion.

Had the services in St. Michael's changed in any way? How were the people being taught, in sermons or otherwise? Rector Franklin, absent for many years from Houghton, and now resident in Windsor Castle, had provided, it would seem, one or two (probably underpaid) curates to take spiritual care of his parish. What were these men teaching the people whom they were serving?

In outward form, the shape of the Liturgy had changed very little. Mass was still said daily, in Latin, and the whole village was expected to he present at the Sunday Mass. Few of the congregation would take Communion, except on Easter Sunday, when probably every adult would partake. If people did intend to take Communion, they were expected to attend church the previous evening, to confess their sins, and to receive absolution (usually also having to perform some minor penance, or to make a small donation to the Church). They were also encouraged to "go to Confession" on other occasions, every few weeks perhaps, so that, if they fell ill and died, it would not have been long since their last Confession, and most of the sins that they had committed would have been already atoned for, by penances performed, and Absolution granted. The few remaining sins could be remitted through penances performed in Purgatory (or through money given to release the deceased sinner from the pains of Purgatory); or, better still, if a priest was in attendance on the person's death-bed, Extreme Unction ("the Last Rites') could be administered, though this probably would still leave some sin to be eradicated through sufferings in Purgatory.

Put like that, it is easy to see why so many people in Germany, and some among the better educated classes In English cities, were attracted to the simplicity of the doctrines of Lutheranism - Justification through Faith, that is the acceptance by the believer of Christ's atoning death as a ransom paid for the "satisfaction" of his (the believer's) sins: that is, he had already been pardoned, as a consequence of Christ's sacrificial death - and such people found it both easier and less onerous to accept than the Church's traditional teaching. But ill-educated pitmen and hands in an area like this would no doubt accept the Church's traditional teachings, grumble about the strictness of the priest, and the hardness of the penances he commanded, but would nevertheless get on with accepting his authority, and performing the penances.

But nevertheless, ideas of Reform were creeping northwards, towards Houghton. William Franklin, the nominal rector, residing in Windsor Castle, and meeting the royal family professionally, seems to have bean growing disillusioned with the religious life of the Court, and was drifting towards Protestant ideas. Despite being an absentee rector, he seems to have been, in many ways, a conscientious man, and probably chose men like-minded to himself, to send to the people of Houghton. In addition, Cuthbert Tunstall, the Bishop of Durham, was also a conscientious man and a devout man, a former friend of Erasmus, and, though he never went over entirely to the ideals of the Reformation, and would be forced out of office when Elizabeth came to the Throne, he was well aware of the defects in the existing Church, and wished to see various reforms implemented. With all these ideas circulating among his ‘betters' the Houghton peasant was probably aware that things were beginning to change within the Church.

He would find his hopes, or fears, justified to some extent, when, in addition to the changes in parish administration already ordained by Thomas Cromwell, some liturgical and catechismal changes were ordered by Archbishop Thomas Cramer.
First, parish priests were ordered to arrange for all their adult parishioners to be taught, in English, the Lord's Prayer, the Ten Commandments and the Apostle’s Creed, and to learn them off by heart. Thus, everyone was expected to acquire some modicum of understanding of Christian doctrine.

Next, Cranmer composed a litany of prayer, in the English language, and priests were instructed to say this Litany in church, in public, on three week-days of every week. This proved generally popular, and those with the leisure to attend, soon began to go to church regularly to hear prayers offered in their own language. Moreover, a translation of the Bible was authorised, and, though the Mass was still said in Latin, the Lessons were now read in English, and it became easier to relate reading and sermon, and for the priest to preach from the text of the days Lesson.

Most important of all, however, it was commanded that every parish church should acquire a large copy of the Bible, in English, and that it Should be kept available, on a chain (as a precaution against theft), fastened to a lectern at the west end of the Church, close to the font. This again proved a huge draw, more so even than the Litany. Soon, it was reported, one could see, in almost any church, at times when no service was being held, a cluster of people gathered round the Bible, those who read better reading out the words to others. (At about this time. it had been estimated [by none other than Sir Thomas More] that, thanks to the chantry schools, half the men of England, and about a quarter of the women, could read and write).

Up to now, it had been illegal to publish Bibles in the English language, and dozens of Lollards had been sent to the stake for possessing or disseminating copies of it. (Oddly enough, it had been perfectly legal to publish translations of the Bible into German, Dutch, French, or any other language: it was the Lollard tradition of prizing their vernacular Bibles which had caused the Church to condemn the publication of an English language translation).

But a man called William Tyndale had set out to defy the Church, and to produce a version of the Bible in contemporary English, translated direct from the Greek and Hebrew (not the Latin, which had been the source of the Lollard Bible), so that every man and woman could have direct access to the Word of God. He left England, and went to Wittenberg, to work with Lutheran scholars, who were publishing the Bible in German. There he produced a complete New Testament, and copies were soon finding their way back to England.

He than moved to Antwerp, to work on the Old Testament. This move was made, partly because Antwerp was just across the sea from England, and smuggling Bibles into the creeks of Eastern England would, it was hoped, be relatively easy. Also, there was a large Jewish community in Antwerp (many of them refugees from the Spanish Inquisition), and Tyndale hoped to find help from them in understanding the Hebrew texts.

He began translating the Hebrew Scriptures, book by book, shipping them over to England, one book at a time. He had got as far as II Chronicles when he was arrested by officers of the Church, and taken to the Catholic University of Louvain, where he was put on trial, found guilty of various heresies (translating the Bible was not in itself, in Belgium, a crime), and burnt to death on the university campus.

Tyndale's version is the basis of the King James Version, until recently the main version of the Bible used in the English-speaking world. However, some of Tyndale's more radical translations were replaced by more conventional phrases in later English Bibles. For Instance. Tyndale had translated the Greek word Ekklesia by "congregation", as he thought that the word "church", with its overtones of modern ecclesiastical organisation and architecture, would not fit the Biblical situation; but later versions went back to "church". Again, Tyndale had translated Agape by "love', as the word "charity", used for instance in the Lollard Bible, seemed, already then, to be more redolent of organised work for the relief of poverty than of real compassion. But later versions, noting the possible erotic implications of 'love", have often gone back to "charity" - "Faith, Hope and Charity", as in Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians.

Though Tyndale's work is the basis of almost all later English Bibles, he was, as we have seen, prevented from completing it. Though modified in various ways, it was used as the basis of the Great Bible, the Bible that, by order of Cramer (and of Cromwell) was set up, on a lectern, inside the door of every parish church in England. Of course, only the New Testament and the historical Books of the Old were Tyndale’s work. The poetic and prophetic Books of the Old Testament, together with the Apocrypha, were largely taken from another English version of the Bible which was being prepared by Miles Coverdale. (He had also had to make his translation abroad, for fear of the English law.) Coverdale's version was not as literal as Tyndale's, but it was very much more poetic.
When, much later. King James's translators set to work, they made use of most of Tyndale, where his text was available, but they made little use of Coverdale. But Coverdale's poetic words still live on (or until recently did so) in the words of the Psalms, the Canticles, and the Lord's Prayer, as printed in the Book of Common Prayer.

Like the Litany, the English-language Bible became immensely popular in town parishes, one could see people (often housewives, taking a break from shopping in the market), at almost any time of day, clustered round the chained Bible on the lectern, reading it and discussing it, even in country parishes like ours. Several people might drop in, in the course of a day, to have a look at the text.

Worse, there were complaints that some people chose to read the chained Bible, even when the words of the Mass were being said by the priest, thus making for two foci of attention within the same church and service.

Eventually the King's government, regardless of Cranmer's enthusiasm for the Bible in English, stepped in, and restricted access to the text. It was decreed that the priest and verger were to be responsible for seeing that access to the chained Bible was to be restricted to certain categories of persons only. Merchants, scholars, clergy were all permitted to consult it, as also ladies and gentlemen of the gentry, nobility and peerage. The common people would hear it read in church, and hear it commented upon in the sermon, but were not permitted to read it for themselves.

However, some people had become so addicted to consulting the church Bible that, forbidden to look at it, they took steps to try and obtain copies for their own homes. An example of a Bible so purchased still exists. It was bought by a shepherd pasturing sheep on Sedgeberrow Hill, in Worcestershire, overlooking the Vale of Evesham. Written on the fly-leaf are the words. "I bought this book (it must have cost him an immense sum, possibly most of a year's wages) when the Testament was abrogated, that shepherds might not read it. I pray God amend that blindness. Written by Robert Williams, keeping sheep upon Sedgeberrow Hill. 1546”.

[Now, in Houghton church, most of the congregation at the main Sunday morning service, do nor use the Bible to follow the readings, and it is not normally offered by the sides-persons. It seems to be regarded as a book only used by those afflicted with excessive zeal, not for ordinary Christians).

But in those days, it seemed like the elixir of life, the promise of Salvation.

The Bible was chained.

The word went free.

Dick Toy

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