Anglican Liturgical Calendar: Commemoration Days

If you’ve ever looked closely at the liturgical calendars we keep available in the church office, you’ve likely noticed that many days throughout the year are marked with people’s names, a brief biographical description, and a date of death. According to a note on page 690 of the 2019 Book of Common Prayer, these days were appointed in the Book of Common Prayer of 1662 as days of optional commemoration (Black Letter Days), and they are designated as either Anglican or Ecumenical and then as one of the following: Martyr, Missionary or Evangelist, Pastor, Teacher of the Faith, Monastic or Religious, Ecumenist, Reformer of the Church, Renewer of Society, or any Saint.  

Two recent commemoration days are of particular interest to us at St. Philip’s: March 3, which honors reformers John and Charles Wesley, and March 24, which honors martyr Thomas Cranmer.

John and Charles Wesley
adapted from “John and Charles Wesley: Anglicans with Kindled Hearts,” by Andrew Brashier (anglicancompass.com)

On March 3rd, we celebrate the feast of John and Charles Wesley, two Anglican priests credited as the founders of Methodism. John was the older brother and natural leader whom Charles looked up to, who co-founded and led the Oxford Holy Club during his university years. As fervent adherents of the Book of Common Prayer, they received ridicule from fellow students and curious outsiders and were members of the “Holy Club.” However, the name that we remember them by is “Methodists,” due to their methodical devotion to receiving Holy Communion regularly, fasting, reading and discussing Scriptures, and keeping the Daily Office.

Nevertheless, no matter how much they tried, both John and Charles felt a distance in their faith. Despite their ordinations to the priesthood in 1728 and 1735, respectively, and both serving as Society for the Propagation of the Gospel missionaries to Georgia (United States), they still wrestled with their own faith and relationship with the Lord. Their missionary trip to Georgia was less than successful, but during the trip, both men witnessed the strong faith of Moravians who shared the perilous trans-Atlantic journey with them. During a tremendous and frightful storm, the brothers were struck by the Moravians’ calm presence, steadfast faith, and hymn-singing, unfazed by the storm.

As noted in an article by Phillip Stone in the October 2018 issue of SC United Methodist Activist, the Wesleys also traveled to Charleston during their stateside journey, as John wanted to meet the Rev. Alexander Garden, St Philip’s rector and the representative of the Anglican Bishop of London. Garden invited Wesley to preach on August 1, 1736, to about 300 parishioners, including several enslaved persons, which seemed to have a profound effect on him.

John Wesley returned to England and attended Moravian meetings, where he received encouragement from Peter Boehler to “preach faith until you have it.” On May 24, 1738, John was forever changed at a Moravian meeting in Aldersgate Street, London, when he heard a reading from Martin Luther’s classic preface to Romans. John described Luther’s words about God changing the heart through faith in Christ in his journal, along with his own reaction: “I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation, and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.” Little did John know that younger brother Charles had had a similar evangelical change of heart just three days before John’s own experience. One year later, Charles would mark this renewal of faith by authoring O For A Thousand Tongues to Sing. This poem was one of over 5,000 poems and hymns that Charles would author. Many others are also very familiar to us at St. Philip’s, including And Can It Be that I Should Gain; Christ the Lord is Risen Today; Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus; Hark! The Herald Angels Sing; Lo! He Comes with Clouds Descending; Ye Servants of God; and Love Divine, All Loves Excelling. In 1744, John and Charles organized the first Methodist conference, often recognized as the beginning of the Methodist church.

Thomas Cranmer
adapted from “Cranmer and the Book of Common Prayer” by Winfield Bevins (anglicancompass.com)

The strange and complex history behind the Anglican Church and the Book of Common Prayer centers around one man: Thomas Cranmer. Cranmer was the most influential religious leader of the English Reformation and instrumental in producing the second most widely read English religious book after the King James Bible.

Cranmer was born in 1489 to a poor family in Nottingham. In 1510, he studied for the priesthood at Jesus College, Cambridge, but forsook this path when he married Joan, the daughter of a local tavern keeper. She died in childbirth, at which point Cranmer re-entered the college and devoted himself to study. At Cambridge, Cranmer was a brilliant theology student and finally became a priest in 1523.

A plague forced Cranmer to leave Cambridge for Essex, where he came to the attention of King Henry VIII. From there, Cranmer went to Germany to learn more about the Protestant Lutheran movement. After calling Cranmer back to England, the king appointed him Archbishop of Canterbury on March 30, 1533, initiating an unusual relationship in which both Cranmer and the king used each other to advance their personal goals. The Catholic Church would not allow King Henry to divorce, but Cranmer consented, believing that the King was God’s sovereign ruler over England, not the Pope. This initiated a series of marriages and divorces by the King, proving to be one of the most controversial periods in English history. Cranmer used his newfound religious influence to embrace and promote Reformation ideals openly throughout England, carefully dancing around the politics of his position and pushing through changes that gradually led to the reformation of the Church of England. Cranmer sponsored the Great Bible in 1539, and during the reign of young Edward VI, Cranmer made the doctrinal changes he believed necessary for the Church.

Cranmer’s greatest achievement came in 1549, when he helped organize the Book of Common Prayer. Cranmer and a committee of twelve of “the most learned and discreet bishops, and other learned men” compiled the prayer book from various sources, including ancient prayers of the early church, Catholic and Orthodox liturgies, and private devotions of the Middle Ages. They translated many of these sources into English. In June 1553, Edward VI agreed to Cranmer’s “42 Articles.” These became the backbone of the “39 Articles” introduced in 1563 during Elizabeth’s reign.

After Edward VI’s death, Thomas Cranmer supported Lady Jane Grey as successor. Her nine-day reign ended at the hands of the Roman Catholic Queen “Bloody” Mary, who tried Cranmer for treason. After privately recanting his protestantism while in prison, he refused to do so publicly on March 21, 1556, and he was burned at the stake as a heretic on the same day. He placed his hand in the fire, the hand with which he had falsely signed the renunciation of his beliefs, and said, “This hath offended!”