Digging Out the Embedded Church - The Maranatha Community

apostolic church enjoyed, and that with spontaneity went a widening of circles of contact
among Christians.
This, too, was the legacy of the Brethren. Although their original desire was to break down
denominational barriers by meeting other Christians in their own territories and by accepting
all believers at Brethren worship meetings, it was not long before contacts with other
believers were shunned by many of the Brethren Assemblies. Yet the concept of the simple
gathering together of all believers on the basis of faith in Christ only did not entirely die in
Brethrenism, and several leaders of the late 20 th Century renewal movements came from its
ranks and advocated open fellowship of believers.
The unity the Oxford Movement strove for was a visible unity of the Church. The concept of
„spiritual ecumenism„ would have held little appeal to the Tractarians. Dissent was as
deplorable as breaking the unity of the visible Church.
Those leaders of the Oxford Movement who did not join the Roman Church still held to their
belief that the Church of England was the Via Media between Protestantism and Roman
Catholicism, both of which were departures from the undivided Church of the Early Fathers.
Given that belief it was logical to see other Churches in England as destroyers of the unity of
a divinely appointed Church, a Church which could be seen everywhere in its parish ministry,
its priests and its bishops.
Something must be written about the „Broad Church„ visions of Christian Unity in the 19 th
Century, because several of its remarkable thinkers and scholars addressed the problem.
First, we must define what we mean by „Broad Church„. Broad Church thinkers felt they
were in tune with the liberal thinking of their day and therefore with the spirit of the age.
They disliked dogmatism, whether Catholic or Evangelical, and put a considerable stress on
reason applied to theology and to the latest Biblical researches. But this does not mean that
their theology was necessarily weakened. They were often men of intense religious feeling
and were distressed by the divisions of denominationalism in the Church. As B G Worrall
says, the Broad Church was „a mood rather than a party, and was, in fact suspicious of
parties.‟ 113
This was particularly true of Frederick Denison Maurice (1805-1872), whose father was a
Unitarian minister and saw most of his family reject Unitarianism to embrace Trinitarian
doctrine, including „F D‟ himself, but the hurt of division never left him. During his time at
university, Maurice refused to subscribe to the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England,
thereby forfeiting his chance to take a degree and fellowship.
In an age of sharp doctrinal disputes Maurice is remarkable for his trying to show that
Christianity is bigger than any of its factions. In his book The Kingdom of Christ he reflects
on three „systems‟ in the religious life of Britain in his day, the „Liberal‟, the „Evangelical„
and the „Catholic„.
He shows sympathy for all three viewpoints but notes their weaknesses. The Liberals want
the unity of the Church but only by rejecting much of the Church‟s heritage, liturgy, and
113 Worrall, B G, The making of the modern Church, SPCK, 1988, pp 96-97.
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