Saints of Autumn: Richard Hooker

Today is the feast day of one of the towering figures of the English Reformation: Richard Hooker (1554-1600), the theologian of the Elizabethan era who invented the concept of the via media -- the middle way -- between Catholicism and Protestantism.

Hooker's theology permeates everything about who we are as Anglicans, and how we approach the life of faith in the way that we do. His work is as relevant today as it was in the 16th century, and his arguments find echoes in many of the conflicts we have today in the Church.

To give you a bit of necessary history, you may recall that the English Reformation began with Henry VIII wanting a divorce, and breaking away from Rome to get it. That unleashed a bloody purge of the church in England, and a backlash after he died from his daughter, Mary, who attempted to re-establish Roman Catholicism. She did not live long enough to succeed.

When Mary's half-sister, Elizabeth, became Queen, the new monarch sought an end to religious conflict while preserving the Church of England as independent from Rome. Her solution was the "Elizabethan Compromise," inscribed in the Articles of Religion – or "39 Articles." You can find the articles beginning page 867 of the Book of Common Prayer. The articles, for their time, were a barebones statement of faith and church polity that left much to the eye of the interpreter.

Elizabeth looked to a brilliant priest, Richard Hooker, to give theological teeth to the English Reformation. He wrote eight books, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, in which he fleshed out a “middle way” between radical Protestantism and Roman Catholicism. His theology became known after his lifetime as the “three-legged stool.” The metaphor was meant to symbolize Hooker's method of how to examine theological questions; such issues should be examined by looking at Scripture, Reason and Tradition. No question should be examined separately or in a vacuum.

Implicit in Hooker's method was that ambiguity could be the result, and successive generations might come to a new result. Even so, Hooker's method was inherently conservative; change was not to be taken lightly or done hastily. Scripture should be interpreted through the lens of reason and experience, and tested against the long tradition of the Church. Hooker came up not with a straight highway, but a curvy road with shoulders on each side.

His masterpiece, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, is not an easy read. I do not recommend it for bedtime devotional reading. The first four books were published in 1594, and fifth in 1597. The final three books were published after his death. I have two copies, both rare, including a copy published in 1632 that contains all eight books.

Hooker argued that the church was not dependent on governments and monarchs, but was alive in the faith of the people. He maintained that Christianity is knit together by two sacraments -- baptism and eucharist.

His interpretation of sacraments cut through the morass of medieval arguments; he maintained that the question was not how the bread and wine are changed, but how we are changed by receiving the bread and wine. "The real presence of Christ's most precious Body and Blood is not to be sought for in the Sacrament, but in the worthy receiver of the Sacrament," he wrote.

Hooker saw bishops as instruments of unity, but he also argued that bishops had no other purpose but ministry to their people. When they cease to serve ministry, they cease to serve as instruments of unity.

Such views may seem commonplace now, but we radical notions in his day. It is a measure of his success that many of his views still underpin who we are as Episcopalians and Anglicans.

The Collect for the day sums it up well:

O God of truth and peace, you raised up your servant Richard Hooker in a day of bitter controversy to defend with sound reasoning and great charity the catholic and reformed religion: Grant that we may maintain that middle way, not as a compromise for the sake of peace, but as a comprehension for the sake of truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Saints of Autumn: Lancelot Andrewes

Today is the feast day of one of the greats of our Anglican tradition, Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626). Born in Barking, England (I love the name of that town), Andrewes oversaw the translation of what became known as the King James Bible (Authorized Version, as it is officially called). Andrewes did much of the translating himself and was the chief editor of the overall project.

He was made bishop successively of Chichester, Ely and then Winchester. He served in the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I with great distinction.

Yet is not just for his political and church accomplishments we honor him today. He should be chiefly remembered as a writer. He crafted prayers that still set the bar high in the English language. Anglicanism's soul is in our prayer book and our poetry, and that is no small measure a credit to Andrewes.

Other Protestant churches produced lengthy statements of doctrine, or "confessions," with towering theologians like Martin Luther and John Calvin setting forth the intricacies of Christianity as they saw it.

We produced poets.

The English reformers set their course by a different compass: their theology was in the music of the words, in the poems and prayers, and they crafted hundreds of them. Sonnets sang to people in ways that doctrinal petitions could not. Andrewes shared the stage with John Donne, William Shakespeare, Richard Hooker and other luminaries of English letters.

He was certainly an accomplished scholar, and his preaching carried heft. But the words did not have to be turgid. Theology did not need to be measured in run-on sentences.

Many of the prayers and phrases in our contemporary prayer book have their origins with Lancelot Andrewes. Here is one of his prayers:

Blessed art Thou, 0 Lord,

Our God, the God of our Fathers;

Who turnest the shadow of death into the morning;

and lightenest the face of the earth;

Who separatest darkness from the face of the light;

and banishest night and bringest back the day;

Who lightenest mine eyes,

that I sleep not in death;

Who deliverest me from the terror by night,

from the pestilence that walketh in darkness;

Who drivest sleep from mine eyes,

and slumber from mine eyelids;

Who makest the outgoings of the morning

and evening to praise Thee;

because I laid me down and slept and rose up again,

for the Lord sustained me; because I waked and beheld,

and my sleep was sweet unto me.

The Saints of Autumn: Hildegard of Bingen

Today we celebrate the feast day of Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179), an abbess on the Rhine who was hugely influential in her own time and whose work continues to touch and inspire in our own time.

She is among the giants of Christian spirituality in the 12th century, a time of flowering of art, music and religious fervor in Europe. Most unusual for her time, Hildegard was a renowned preacher. Her advice was sought by paupers and kings. In 1141, Hildegard had a vision, and at its end she wrote:

And it came to pass ... when I was 42 years and 7 months old, that the heavens were opened and a blinding light of exceptional brilliance flowed through my entire brain. And so it kindled my whole heart and breast like a flame, not burning but warming... and suddenly I understood of the meaning of expositions of the books...

She continued to write about her prayers and meditations, using both male and female images of God. She also composed a great deal of music, much of it we still have. Her mystical chants are mediations on her prayers, and her music has been rediscovered in our own time. The group Anonymous 4 has several recordings of Hildegard's works that I have long enjoyed. Here is a sampling from one: