The National Churches of England, Ireland, and Scotland 1801-46
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Oxford University Press
Published:6th Dec '01
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
In 1801, the United Kingdom was a semi-confessional State, and the national established Churches of England, Ireland and Scotland were vital to the constitution. They expressed the religious conscience of the State and served as guardians of the faith. Through their parish structures, they provided religious and moral instruction, and rituals for common living. This book explores the struggle to strengthen the influence of the national Churches in the first half of the nineteenth century. For many, the national Churches would help form the United Kingdom into a single Protestant nation-state, with shared beliefs, values and a sense of national mission. Between 1801 and 1825, the State invested heavily in the national Churches. But during the 1830s the growth of Catholic nationalism in Ireland and the emergence of liberalism in Britain thwarted the efforts to unify the nation around the established Churches. Within the national Churches themselves, moreover, voices began calling for independence from the State connection - leading to the Oxford Movement in England and the Disruption of the Church of Scotland.
Stewart Brown is the first in the modern period to have tried to produce a comprehensive study setting all three churches in comparative perspective. With a wealth of material to hand, this was an ambitious task. The result is a triumph of clarity and scholarship ... this will become a vital resource for historians of British religion. * Theology *
... succeeds in setting a new agenda for the study of religious establishments in the United Kingdom and therefore should command the attention of both religious and political historians of Britain and Ireland. * The Journal of Theological Studies *
... exceptionally well-written. * Theology *
A very pertinent book at a time when the established status of the Church of England is becoming a live political issue. * The Expository Times *
Wide-ranging and unusual survey of the national Churches of the United Kingdom in the first half of the 19th century ... Brown's study is unusual in its scope, and because it presents a number of historic models for "established" and "national" Churches. * Church Times *
Excellent book ... It is Brown's achievement to demonstrate conclusively that the early ninteenth-century histories of the national Churches were in fact inextricably intertwined because all were enrolled in a state-sponsored project to consolidate the newly united kingdom. Brown's accounts of the individual histories of the three Churches are admirably grounded in a wide range of source material and an acquaintance with important recent scholarship. * Arthur Burns, Times Literary Supplement *
The novelty of the argument lies in Brown's exposure of both the common dynamics simultaneously driving events in England, Scotland and Ireland, and also of how developments in one Church could have significant, sometimes paradoxical consequences for the others ... Brown provides a satisfyingly coherent narrative ... Stewart Brown provides a fruitful new agenda for ecclesiastical historians. * Arthur Burns, Times Literary Supplement *
ISBN: 9780199242351
Dimensions: 226mm x 146mm x 29mm
Weight: 669g
472 pages