The Pink Flamingo :: William Laud, Antidisenstablishmentarism, & A Very Strange Sign

"...Laud supported the king against the Puritans in Parliament. Eventually Parliament and king fought each other. Parliament accused Laud of treason. Laud almost won his case, because he had acted with strict legality. The House of Commons was able to convict him only by arguing that it could declare any crimes it pleased to be treason. When Laud was brought to the scaffold, he preached, taking as his text Hebrews 12:2, "Let us run with patience the race that is set before us." He forgave his enemies and asked their forgiveness. His last prayer was, "Lord, I am coming as fast as I can: I know I must pass through the shadow of death before I can come to Thee; but it is but umbra mortis, a mere shadow of death...Thou, by thy merits and passion, hath broken through the jaws of death." He prayed for peace in England. After a moment of silence he added, "Lord receive my soul." He was seventy-two when the blade lopped off his head...."

From the Wounded Bird Blog (of the actual Diocese in San Joaquin, CA)

"...If you think the difficulties that we experience in the Anglican Church today are bad, go to the Lectionary and read James Kiefer's account of the "Surplice Wars". Of course, the wars were about much more than surplices. William Laud was the Archbishop of Canterbury during the reign of Charles I, a violent period in English history. In the end, he was executed in the Tower, as Kiefer says, "...not because there was any evidence of his guilt, but because the House of Commons was determined that he should die." Laud's prayer before the ax came down was, "The Lord receive my soul, and have mercy on me, and bless this kingdom with peace and charity, that there may not be this effusion of Christian blood amongst them."...

Today is the Anglican and Episcopal feast day honoring Archbishop William Laud, who went to the block on this day in 1645. Long story short, Laud was one of the last church leaders who believed in the Divine Right of Kings. He gave his life defending the Church of England and Charles I's right to be king. Evidently he was something of a zealot and a pain in the tush, but he absolutely detested the Puritan Calvinism that Oliver Cromwell was forcing upon the land, and felt the Church of England needed to regain the trappings of the Catholic Church. Basically our Episcopal and Anglican churches even look like they do today because of Laud. He was also one of the major advocates of Antidisenstablishmentarism. One of his other contributions, used by Episcopalians on a regular basis, was the 1637 Scottish Book of Common Prayer, from which our US version is taken.

From the Biblical Sketches of Memorable Christians

"..An example is the surplice controversy. We have all encountered Christians who are opposed to celebrating Christmas on the grounds that (a) the Bible nowhere commands us to celebrate Christmas, and does not mention the 25th of December; and (b) the pagans had a festival in December at which they built fires and feasted and exchanged gifts, from which it follows that those who celebrate Christmas are participating in pagan rites. Similarly, in the late 1500's and early 1600's, there were Christians in England who objected to the garment called the surplice. When participating in the services of Morning and Evening Prayer in Church, clergy, including choir members, normally wore a cassock (a black, floor-length, fairly tight-fitting garment) covered by a surplice (a white, knee-length, fairly loose garment with loose sleeves). The Puritans objected to the surplice (a) as not mentioned in the Bible, and (b) as something that the Roman Catholics had worn before the Reformation, which made it one of the props of idolatrous worship, and marked anyone who wore it as an idolater. Archbishop Laud regarded it as a seemly, dignified, garment, an appropriate response to the Apostle Paul's injunction, "Let all things be done decently and in order." The Puritans thought differently, and violently interrupted services at which the surplice was worn. On one occasion, a group of Puritans broke into an Oxford chapel the night before a service and stole the surplices, which they thrust into a the dung-pit of a privy. Again, a woman marched into Lichfield Cathedral, accompanied by the town clerk and his wife, and ruined the altar hangings with a bucket of pitch...."

Yes, there is such a word and it means something. Antidisenstablishmentarism is simply the act of being against disenstablishmentarism. Disenstablishmentarism is the advocacy of the separation of the Church of England from the Throne and from the State. The First Amendment need not apply here.

"...The famous pun "give great praise to the Lord, and little laud to the devil" is a warning to Charles attributed to the official court jester or "fool" Archie Armstrong. Laud was known to be touchy about his diminutive stature.

Laud was a sincere Anglican and loyal Englishman, who must have been frustrated at the charges of Popery levelled against him by the Puritan element in the Church. Whereas Strafford saw the political dangers of Puritanism, Laud saw the threat to the episcopacy. But the Puritans themselves felt threatened: the Counter-Reformation was succeeding abroad, and the Thirty Years' War was not progressing to the advantage of the Protestants. It was inevitable that in this climate, Laud's aggressive high church policy was seen as a sinister development. A year after Laud's appointment as Archbishop of Canterbury, the ship Griffin left for America, carrying religious dissidents such as the Puritan minister Anne Hutchinson. (see note)

Laud's policy was influenced by another aspect of his character: his desire to impose total uniformity on the Church. This, too, was driven by a sincere belief that this was the duty of his office, but, to those of even slightly differing views, it came as persecution. Perhaps this had the unintended consequence of garnering support for the most implacable opponents of the Anglican compromise. In 1637, William Prynne, John Bastick and Henry Burton sentenced to mutilation (removal of ears and branding on both cheeks) for the crime of seditious libel Prynne alone was to suffer the fate of having "SL" branded on his forehead. Although it stood for "Seditious libeller, Prynne argued it stood for "Stigmata Laudis".

His intolerance towards the Presbyterians extended to Scotland, where it led to the Covenanter movement and the Bishops' Wars. The Long Parliament of 1640 accused him of treason, resulting in his imprisonment in the Tower of London, where he remained throughout the early stages of the English Civil War. In the spring of 1644, he was brought to trial, but it ended without being able to reach a verdict. The parliament took up the issue, and eventually passed a bill of attainder under which he was beheaded on January 10, 1645 on Tower Hill, notwithstanding being granted a royal pardon.

This was the British Civil War.

NOTE ON ANNE HUTCHINSON:
The women's movement was born from the tradition of Puritan women who were strong, well educated, and believed that women were equal to men. Her descendants include my cousin Jean's husband, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Mitt Romney, Chevy Chase, Marilyn Monroe, FDR, and Charles Manson. Our American version of religious freedom is a direct result of the British Civil War.

READINGS

Psalm 73: 24-29
You guide me with your counsel,
   and afterwards you will receive me with honour.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
   And there is nothing on earth that I desire other than you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
   but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever.
Indeed, those who are far from you will perish;
   you put an end to those who are false to you.
But for me it is good to be near God;
   I have made the Lord God my refuge,
   to tell of all your works.

Matthew 10:32-39

‘Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others,
I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven;
but whoever denies me before others,
I also will deny before my Father in heaven.
Not Peace, but a Sword
‘Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth;
I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me;
and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me;
and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
Those who find their life will lose it,
and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.

THE STRANGE IRONY OF THE DAY
From Blue Crab Blvd comes a story that is even more ironic as it occurred on the eve of the Saint Day set aside for William Laud. Laud went to his death protecting the divine right of kings. He was a leading spirit in the antidisenstablishmentarism. Perhaps he was looking down on England last night when a bill that would have separated the Crown from the Church was tabled. The number of the bill was 666. Even stranger, the topic of blasphemy was being discussed. Perhaps, for the first time in a long time, we have a sign about who the ultimate winner of the War on Terror and the Battle for the Soul of England is going to be – and it ain’t gonna be Islam.