The Cowley Fathers

Serenhedd James

Description

A definitive history of one of the most significant religious orders to emerge in the Anglican church, the Cowley Fathers - the first men’s religious order to be founded in the Church of England since the Reformation.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Monasticism
• Religion

Informations

• Publié par: Hymns Ancient & Modern
• Date de parution: 30 juillet 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9781786221858
• Langue: English

Extrait

The Cowley Fathers
A History of the English Congregation of the Society of St John the Evangelist
Serenhedd James






© The Fellowship of St John (UK) Trust Association 2019
First published in 2019 by the Canterbury Press Norwich
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The Author has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
to be identified as the Author of this Work
British Library Cataloguing in Publication data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
978 1 78622 183 4
Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd





Contents
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgement of Sources
Abbreviations
Introduction

1. In the Beginning
2. Young Vipers
3. Hopes Dashed and Restored
4. Floreat Cowley
5. Growing Pains
6. Building for Success
7. Subjects Missionary and Religious
8. A New Century
9. Fruit Formed and Forming
10. Wreaths of Empire
11. One Big Family
12. Faith and Works
13. Brothers in Arms
14. In the Furnace
15. Re-Pitching the Tent
16. Catholic and Evangelistic
17. Life and Vigour
18. Battle on Two Fronts
19. Winds of Change
20. Comings and Goings
21. Axes and Hammers
22. A New Look
23. Back to the Future
24. Beyond the Sunset
25. The Long Day Closes

Appendix 1
Appendix 2
Select Bibliography
Plates




For the Kuttels and the Walkers,
and in loving memory of Bing




Acknowledgements
The Trustees of the Fellowship of St John the Evangelist (UK) Trust Association, invited me to establish the Cowley Project as its Director in 2014 and to write this book as its opening phase. It has been impossible to produce a work of this size and scope without incurring a large debt of gratitude. My parents have been as supportive as ever; and I was fortunate at the outset to have been able to appoint as my research assistant the talented and unflappable Andrew Doll, who cheerfully and competently shouldered a number of tasks – not least the Bibliography – to allow me to undertake more wide-ranging work almost immediately.
The members of the American congregation of the SSJE gave me warm hospitality at their monastery on the banks of the Charles River at Cambridge, MA, and at their country retreat at Emery House, West Newbury. Br Geoffrey Tristram SSJE and Br James Koester SSJE, successive Superiors while the book was being written, were generous with much helpful advice and encouragement; and I was glad to be able to meet the late Br Eldridge Pendleton SSJE shortly before his death. In Boston, the Revd Allan B. Warren III introduced me to the Church of the Advent; and Lynn Smith, the Registrar-Historiographer of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, welcomed me to the diocesan archives and took me to visit St John’s, Bowdoin Street, before its closure.
Long-suffering librarians and archivists have dealt with me patiently and gently: they include Anna James, Librarian of Pusey House; Catherine Hilliard and Marjory Szurko at St Stephen’s House; Simon Sheppard and the team at the Church of England Record Centre; and the staff at Gladstone’s Library and the Oxfordshire History Centre. Zofia Sulej and Gabriele Mohale at the Library of the University of the Witwatersrand ensured that my visit to the SSJE archives deposited there was as enjoyable as it was fruitful, and I was grateful for the hospitality of the Herzov family during my stay in Johannesburg.
At Cape Town Bing and Flower Walker gave me a home away from home; and thanks are also due to Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, the Very Revd Michael Weeder, the Revd Richard Cogill, Patricia Ellis, the Revd Richard Girdwood, Walter and Hilary Loening, John Ramsdale, William de Villiers, and the late Canon Rowan Smith. Writers on similar subjects have helped to crystallise my thoughts on a number of occasions: among them Dr Petà Dunstan, Br Steven Haws CR, the Venerable Luke Miller, Dr John Morgan-Guy, Dr Annie Skinner, and Simon Stubbings.
Others have prospered the work in a number of ways, particularly the Rt Revd Norman Banks; Jon and Kirsten Bickford; the Revd Denis Bovey; Brendan Brett; the Venerable Michael and Mrs (Daphne) Brotherton; the Revd Alan Carr; Jane Casey; Judith Curthoys; Christopher Eames; Sr Elizabeth Jane CSMV; Lady Antonia Fraser; Dr Bernard Gowers; the Venerable David Gunn-Johnston; Michael Hall; John and Audrey Hamilton; Canon Jeremy Haselock; Catherine Hudson; Peter, Julienne, Melck and Rorke Kuttel; the Revd Dr Ayla Lepine; Fr Jacob Lewis; Prebendary Paul Lockett; the Revd Graham Lunn; Allen and Elizabeth Mills; Giles, Dani, Fergus, Rory and Lachie Neville; Dr Mark Philpott; Harriet Rix; Graham Sanders; William Smith; the Revd John Stather; Elizabeth Tucker; Sean, Petra, Blue and Keanan Walker; Canon Robin Ward; Professor Michael Wheeler; the Revd Gavin Williams; and Fr Mark Woodruff. Peter Saville, then of University College and now of the Middle Temple, read the chapters on the First World War; and his swiftly tailored response shook off some slips of the pen. The Revd Professor Mark Chapman generously read and commented on the manuscript; and the Revd Christine Smith, Mary Matthews, and the team at Canterbury Press put up with me uncomplainingly throughout the publishing process. All errors and omissions are, of course, my own.
That Bob Jeffery, Geoffrey Rowell, and Bing Walker did not live to see the book completed is a matter of not a little personal sadness. Bob was one of its doughtiest champions, having spent decades associated with the SSJE: I benefitted greatly from his memory and insight; and he was still reading the early part of the manuscript in the final days of his life. Bishop Geoffrey also encouraged it from the beginning; and while he lived was unfailingly supportive of my work as a nineteenth-century ecclesiastical historian. Bing had never heard of the Cowley Fathers until I arrived on his doorstep on the other side of the world; but he welcomed me nonetheless with the overwhelming generosity that was his trademark. The same generosity characterises his family spread across the globe; and, with love and appreciation, it is to them that I dedicate this book.




Acknowledgement of Sources
Every effort has been made to contact the copyright owners, and the publisher would be grateful for information on any omissions.
John Betjeman, “Anglo-Catholic Congresses”, High & Low (London: John Murray, 1966), p. 37.
Forrest, S. J., Parson’s Play-pen (London: A. R. Mowbray, 1968), f. 520.
Mascall, E. L., Pi in the High (Faith Press, 1959), f. xviii.




Abbreviations
ASSP – All Saints Sisters of the Poor
BCP – Book of Common Prayer
BHT – Brotherhood of the Holy Trinity
CC – Central Council
CE – Cowley Evangelist
CMS – Church Missionary Society
CNI – Church of North India
CR – Community of the Resurrection
CSI – Church of South India
CSJB – Community of St John the Baptist (Clewer)
CSMV – Community of St Mary the Virgin (Wantage)
CWAS – Cowley, Wantage, and All Saints Missionary Association
ECU – English Church Union
FSJ – Fellowship of St John
FSJTA – Fellowship of St John (UK) Trust Association
GenC – General Chapter
GreC – Greater Chapter
NS – Society and Fellowship of St John News Sheet
OMC – Oxford Mission to Calcutta
OSB – Order of St Benedict
PC – Provincial Chapter
PH – Pusey House
PM – Cowley St John Parish Magazine
RAMC – Royal Army Medical Corps
SDC – Society of the Divine Compassion
SLG – Sisters of the Love of God
SPCK – Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge
SPG – Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts
SSC – Society of the Holy Cross
SSF – Society of St Francis
SSH – St Stephen’s House
SSJE – Society of St John the Evangelist
SSM – Society of the Sacred Mission
UMCA – Universities’ Mission to Central Africa
USPG – United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel




Introduction
Our community is intended in some sort to realize upon the earth
that vision of our great Patron as to the heavenly hope. O may it be!
— Richard Meux Benson SSJE, Instructions on the Religious Life , 1874
By the time Richard Meux Benson died in 1915 the Oxford Movement was in full swing, and on the cusp of its most flamboyant phase. Benson had become regarded as one of its grandees; but that is an image that needs to be treated with some caution, becau