Conformity and Orthodoxy in the English Church, C.1560-1660 - (Studies in Modern British Religious History) by Peter Lake & Michael Questier

About the Book

The first general study of different attitudes to conformity and the political and cultural significance of the resulting consensus on what came to be regarded as orthodox.

Book Synopsis

The first general study of different attitudes to conformity and the political and cultural significance of the resulting consensus on what came to be regarded as orthodox.

The different ways in which people expressed `conformity' or `nonconformity' to the 1559 settlement of religion in the English church have generally been treated separately by historians: Catholic recusancy and occasional conformity; Protestant ministerial subscription to the canons and articles of the Church of England; the innovations made by avant-garde conformist clerics to the early Stuart Church; and conformist support for the prayer book in the 1640s. This is the first book to look across the board at what was politically important about conformity, aiming to assess how different attitudes to conformity affected what was regarded as orthodox or true religion in the English Church: that is, the political and cultural significance of the ways in which one could obey or disobey the law governing the Church. The introduction places the articles in the context of the recent historiography of the late Tudor and early Stuart Church.

PETER LAKE is Professor of History, Princeton University; MICHAEL QUESTIER is Senior Research Fellow, St Mary's Strawberry Hill.

Contributors: ALEXANDRA WALSHAM, MICHAEL QUESTIER, PAULINE CROFT, KENNETH FINCHAM, THOMAS FREEMAN, PETER LAKE, ANDREW FOSTER, NICHOLAS TYACKE, DAVID COMO, JUDITH MALTBY.

Review Quotes

A highly significant as well as controversial work: a must-read for all students of the religious nistory of the time... a book packed with ideas, references and invormation. RECUSANT HISTORY This outstanding collection makes significant advances in our understanding of English religion in the period, and every study in it is instructive and contributes positively to its larger purpose. ALBION Important volume. HISTORY Not a single dud article... one of the most important contributions to the history of the early modern Church of England to have appeared for a long time.-- "JOURNAL OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY"

A well-executed volume. The essays give us a good introduction to the problems of conformity and orthodoxy in the English Church. The case studies included are insightful and meticulously researched.-- "SEVENTEENTH CENTURY NEWS"