Convocation of 1563

Matthew Parker who was Archbishop of Canterbury had prepared documents outlining further reform in the Church of England, as had other bishops. A more thorough-going reform agenda was supported by over 30 of the participants. A compromise version, the "six articles", was narrowly defeated on a vote. The result was that the momentum for reform of the Church by its constitutional procedures was halted. Parker steered the outcome towards the via media.{{cite book|author=Patrick Collinson|author-link=Patrick Collinson|title=Archbishop Grindal, 1519-1583: The Struggle for a Reformed Church|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hREq8H5DDRUC&pg=PA162|date=1 January 1979|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-03831-8|page=162}} "Swiss-inspired reformists" were headed off.{{cite book|author=Paul D. L. Avis|title=Anglicanism and the Christian Church: Theological Resources in Historical Perspective|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dpjtH9MxW_8C&pg=PA20|year=2002|publisher=A&C Black|isbn=978-0-567-08849-9|page=20}}

The Convocation restored the position of the Thirty-Nine Articles in the Church of England. More accurately said, the Forty-Two Articles of Edward VI were reduced to a draft at this point, which was widely supported, and eventually enforced after 1571. There were further proposals from reformers, in particular on canon law and liturgy, some of which originated from a group among the bishops. These, however, proved contentious, and did not pass. Subsequent contestation of the same issues made some of them a matter of authority.{{cite book|author=Felicity Heal|author-link=Felicity Heal|title=Reformation in Britain and Ireland|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5SRANUBTt3AC&pg=PA362|accessdate=21 November 2012|year=2005|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-928015-5|page=362}}

Collinson comments that

Moves to improve the settlement in the convocation of 1563 were led by the bishops rather than by 'Puritans' in the lower house [...]{{cite ODNB|id=24649|authorlink=Patrick Collinson|first=Patrick|last=Collinson|title=Sandys, Edwin}}

Dawley writes that probably the surprise of the Convocation

[...] was not the amount of support given to the Precisians but the unexpected extent of loyalty to the existing regulations,

"Precisian" being the term used by Parker for his opponents on the issue of clerical dress.{{cite book|author=Powel Mills Dawley|title=John Whitgift and the Reformation|url=https://archive.org/details/johnwhitgiftrefo0000dawl|url-access=registration|year=1955|pages=[https://archive.org/details/johnwhitgiftrefo0000dawl/page/66 66] and 70|publisher=Adam & Charles Black}}

Of 20 bishops of the time (the see of Oxford being vacant), there were 12 who had left the Kingdom of England under Mary Tudor: the "Marian exiles". Of those who had remained, some had done so covertly.

Of these bishops, 19 attended at the start—not Jones, who was acting as proxy for the aged Anthony Kitchin.{{cite book|author=Charles Hardwick|author-link=Charles Hardwick|title=A history of the Articles of religion: to which is added a series of documents, from A. D. 1536 to A. D. 1615; together with illustrations from contemporary sources|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qXkXAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA129|accessdate=22 November 2012|year=1852|publisher=H. Hooker|pages=128–9}}{{cite book|author1=Theodore K. Rabb|author2=Jerrold E. Seigel|title=Action and Conviction in Early Modern Europe: Essays in Honor of E.H. Harbison|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NhvWCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA139|date=8 December 2015|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-1-4008-7606-8|page=139 note 23}}

There were 27 in the Lower House of Convocation who had been émigrés of Queen Mary's time.{{cite book|author=William P. Haugaard|title=Elizabeth and the English Reformation: The Struggle for a Stable Settlement of Religion|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YRY7AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA27|accessdate=22 November 2012|year=1968|publisher=CUP Archive|page=27|id=GGKEY:LA9WJTAP5T9}} An estimate of over 50 who had conformed in Mary's reign has also been given.{{cite book|author=William P. Haugaard|title=Elizabeth and the English Reformation: The Struggle for a Stable Settlement of Religion|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YRY7AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA389|accessdate=23 November 2012|year=1968|publisher=CUP Archive|pages=389–90|id=GGKEY:LA9WJTAP5T9}} Carlson argues for a definite group of 34 Puritan reformers in the Lower House.{{cite book|author1=Theodore K. Rabb|author2=Jerrold E. Seigel|title=Action and Conviction in Early Modern Europe: Essays in Honor of E. H. Harbison|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NhvWCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA134|date=8 December 2015|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-1-4008-7606-8|page=134}}

Nicholas Wotton, Dean of Canterbury, did not attend.(ODNB)

The Convocation was called simultaneously with a Parliament, and took place in London, in St Paul's Cathedral.s:The Cambridge Modern History/Volume II/Chapter XVI{{cite book|author=Bruce C. Daniels|title=New England Nation: The Country the Puritans Built|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=thTIAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA20|date=6 September 2012|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-1-137-02563-0|pages=20–}} Its sessions took place from 11 January to 14 April 1563 (N.S.).{{cite book|author1=Theodore K. Rabb|author2=Jerrold E. Seigel|title=Action and Conviction in Early Modern Europe: Essays in Honor of E. H. Harbison|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NhvWCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA133|date=8 December 2015|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-1-4008-7606-8|page=133 note 1}} Robert Weston opened the Convocation on 12 January, formally, with a prorogation to the following day.{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/stream/livesofarchbisho09hookuoft#page/340/mode/2up|title=Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury|last=Hook|first=Walter Farquhar|year=1860|work=Internet Archive|publisher=Bentley|volume=9|pages=341–2|accessdate=27 January 2016|location=London}} The actual proceedings of Convocation opened on 13 January, when the Litany was sung, and a Latin sermon by William Day preached.{{cite ODNB|id=7373|first=Brett|last=Usher|title=Day, William}}{{cite book|author=Ralph Churton|author-link=Ralph Churton|title=The Life of Alexander Nowell Dean of St. Paul's|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vBI6AAAAcAAJ&pg=PA8|year=1809|publisher=University Press|page=8}}{{cite book|author=Church of England|title=The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments, and Other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church, According to the Use of the United Church of England and Ireland: Together with the Psalter Or Psalms of David ... and the Form Or Manner of Making, Ordaining, and Consecrating of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. The Text Taken from the Sealed Book for the Chancery ... With Notes, Legal and Historical|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7PnbWWGYyhkC&pg=PA540|year=1849|publisher=For the Ecclesiastical History Society|pages=540 note}}

The subsequent passage of the 39 Articles into the orthodoxy of the Church of England was tortuous. There are various versions of the Articles: manuscript from the Convocation, printed in Latin (Reyner Wolfe) and English by John Cawood and Richard Jugge (1563); printed later.{{cite book|author=John James Tayler|title=A retrospect of the religious life of England: or, The church, Puritanism, and free inquiry|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-hULAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA55|accessdate=23 November 2012|year=1853|publisher=J. Chapman|page=55}} A bill in the Parliament of 1566 to confirm the articles from the Convocation was halted in the House of Lords, by pressure from the Queen.{{cite book|author=Wallace T. MacCaffrey|title=Shaping of the Elizabethan Regime|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VBjWCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA214|date=8 December 2015|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-1-4008-7586-3|page=214}}

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Category:History of the Church of England

Category:1560s in England

Category:1562 in Christianity

Category:1563 in Christianity

Category:1562 in England

Category:1563 in England

Category:16th-century church councils

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