William Edward Addis

“ There is nothing in the Anglican ordinal to show that the Holy Ghost is given for the consecration of a bishop in the Roman sense. In 1704 John Gordon, formerly Anglican bishop of Galloway, gave to the Holy Office an account of the manner in which he had been consecrated. The Sacred Congregation, with the pope’s approval, declared his orders to be null. The constant practice has been to reordain unconditionally Anglican priests and deacons. ”

“ The fact is that the Montanists represented the conservatism of their day, and even now the Roman Church admits the right of laymen to baptize when a priest cannot be had. The Apostolic Constitutions (viii. 32) allow a layman to preach, if he be skilful and reverent, and the language of St Ignatius (Ad Smyrn. 8) , “Let that be esteemed a valid Eucharist which is celebrated in the presence of the bishop or of some one commissioned by him,” is really inconsistent with any firmly established principle that celebration by a layman was in itself absolutely null (see also Eucharist) . ”

“ The Roman Church forbids ordination to higher grades unless the candidate has received all the inferior orders. Further, a cleric is bound to exercise the minor orders for a year before he can be ordained subdeacon, he must be subdeacon for a year before he is ordained deacon, deacon for a year before he is made priest. ”

“ The necessity of reference to sacerdotal power in the ordination of priests and bishops will be considered a little farther on in connexion with Anglican orders.
Deaconesses in the East received the imposition of the bishop’s hands, but could not ascend to the priesthood. The Roman theologians regard them as incapable of true ordination, alleging 1 Tim. ii. 12. An unbaptized person is also incapable of valid ordination. On the other hand, St Thomas holds that orders may be validly conferred on children who have not come to the use of reason. ”

“ Therein we are told that the threefold ministry of bishops, priests and deacons may be traced back to apostolic times, and in the final revision of 1662 a clause was added to the effect that no one is to be accounted “a lawful bishop, priest or deacon in the Church of England,” unless he has had episcopal consecration or ordination. The words “in the Church of England” deserve careful notice. ”

“ The registers at St David’s make no mention of his consecration, but this counts for nothing. No reference in the registers can be produced for many ordinations of undoubted validity. Parker thus was consecrated by a true bishop according to the Edwardine ordinal, i.e. he received imposition of hands with the words, “Take the Holy Ghost and remember that thou stir up the grace of God which is in thee by imposition of hands.” The corresponding form for the ordination of a priest was “Receive thou the Holy Ghost: whose sins thou dost forgive,” &c. ”

“ For lawful ordination in the Roman Church, a man must be confirmed, tonsured, in possession of all orders lower than that which he proposes to receive, of legitimate birth, not a slave or notably mutilated, of good life and competent knowledge. By the present law (Concil. Trid. Sess. xxiii. de Ref. cap. 12) a subdeacon must have begun his twenty-second, a deacon his twenty-third, a priest his twenty-fifth year. ”

“ Here we pause to remark that in Tertullian’s view the church as a whole possesses the power of self-government and administration, though in the interest of discipline and convenience it delegates that power to special officers. It is, he says, the “authority of the church” which has constituted the difference between the governing body and the laity, and in an emergency a layman may baptize and celebrate (Exhort. Cast. 7) , nor can this statement be lightly set aside on the plea that Tertullian, when he so wrote, had lapsed into Montanism. ”

“ It will be best to give first the leading facts, and then the inferences which may be drawn from them.
The English Church derives its orders through Matthew Parker, archbishop of Canterbury, who was consecrated in 1559 by William Barlow, bishop-elect of Chichester. We may assume that the rite employed was serious and reverent, and there is no longer any need to refute the fable of a ludicrous consecration at the “Nag’s Head” Anglican orders. tavern. We may further take for granted that Barlow was a bishop in the Catholic sense of the word. ”

“ So the canons of Hippolytus (about A.D. 250) decree that a confessor who has suffered torment for his adherence to the Christian faith should merit and obtain the rank of presbyter forthwith—“Immo confessio est ordination ejus.” Likewise in A.D. 314 the thirteenth canon of Ancyra (for the true reading see Bishop Wordsworth’s Ministry of Grace, p. 140) assumes that city presbyters may with the bishop’s leave ordain other presbyters. Even among the medieval schoolmen, some (Gore, Church and Ministry, p. 377) maintained that a priest might be empowered by the pope to ordain other priests. ”

“ The Anglican Church is content with the threefold ministry of bishops, priests and deacons, but in recent times the bishops have appointed lay-readers, licensed to read prayers and preach in buildings which are not consecrated. ”

“ In the first place, much would be done in practical administration by persons who held no definite position formally assigned to them, although they wielded great influence on account of their age, talents and character. ”