Abstract

The Oxford Movement, initiating what is commonly called the Catholic Revival of the Church of England and of global Anglicanism more generally, has been a perennial subject of study by historians since its beginning in the 1830s. But the leader of the movement whose name was most associated with it during the nineteenth century, Edward Bouverie Pusey, has long been neglected by historical studies of the Anglican Catholic Revival. This collection of essays seeks to redress the negative and marginalizing historiography of Pusey, and to increase current understanding of both Pusey and his culture. The essays take Pusey’s contributions to the Oxford Movement and its theological thinking seriously; most significantly, they endeavour to understand Pusey on his own terms, rather than by comparison with Newman or Keble. The volume reveals Pusey as a serious theologian who had a significant impact on the Victorian period, both within the Oxford Movement and in wider areas of church politics and theology. This reassessment is important not merely to rehabilitate Pusey’s reputation, but also to help our current understanding of the Oxford Movement, Anglicanism and British Christianity in the nineteenth century.

Rowan Strong is Associate Professor of Church History at Murdoch University, Australia. He is the author of several books on the Oxford Movement and Anglicanism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and has published numerous articles on Christianity in the British Empire. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Carol Engelhardt Herringer is Professor of History at Wright State University, USA. She is the author of the monograph ‘Victorians and the Virgin Mary: Religion and Gender in England 1830-85’ as well as of several articles on Victorian religion and culture.

The Oxford Movement, initiating what is commonly called the Catholic Revival of the Church of England and of global Anglicanism more generally, has been a perennial subject of study by historians since its beginning in the 1830s. But the leader of the movement whose name was most associated with it during the nineteenth century, Edward Bouverie Pusey, has long been neglected by historical studies of the Anglican Catholic Revival. What attention has been paid to him by scholars has produced a largely negative picture of this complex man. This collection of essays seeks to redress the negative and marginalizing historiography of Pusey, in order to better understand both Pusey and his culture. The essays take Pusey’s contributions to the Oxford Movement and its theological thinking seriously; most significantly, they endeavour to understand Pusey on his own terms, rather than by comparison with Newman or Keble.

This collection of essays is derived from a conference on ‘Edward Bouverie Pusey and the Catholic Revival’ held at Ascot Priory, England in September 2009. It was attended by scholars from Britain, Europe, the United States and Australia. Broadly, the aim was to resuscitate Pusey as a figure of importance in Oxford Movement studies, in keeping with his contemporary importance during the Movement itself. The essays rescue both Pusey’s personality and theology from scholarly marginality, and place him in the same prominent place within the Oxford Movement that he had during his lifetime.

Together these essays represent an important step towards giving a more historically accurate view of Pusey. The essays do not subscribe to the hagiography of Liddon’s biography, nor do they exhibit the hostility typical of more recent works. Instead, the essays in the volume reveal Pusey as a serious theologian who had a significant impact on the Victorian period, both within the Oxford Movement and in wider areas of church politics and theology. This reassessment is important not merely to rehabilitate Pusey’s reputation, but also help contemporary understanding of the Oxford Movement, Anglicanism and British Christianity in the nineteenth century.

‘In a wide-ranging set of essays that are both scholarly and accessible, the authors make a persuasive case for a reassessment of Pusey’s life and significance. He emerges from these pages a greater theologian and a more sympathetic human being than he is usually considered to be. This is an exciting contribution to our understanding of the High Church Revival in Anglicanism, and a provocative and important study of one of its greatest figures.’ —Reverend Dr Jeremy Morris, Dean, King’s College, University of Cambridge