The Victorian clergyman is a familiar character in the fiction of the period,
especially in the novels of well-known authors, Anthony Trollope and George
Eliot. Though text and pictures, this book sets out to tell this clergyman's
story and set him firmly in the context of the nineteenth-century Church of
England, revealing how Victorian clergy differed from those of the present day.
Anglicanism presents a broad spectrum of belief and practice, and the reign
of Queen Victoria, when religion waxed much larger in the national consciousness
than it does today, was a time of many controversies.
At one extreme there were so-called 'Low Church' Evangelicals; at the other
'High Church' Tactarians, keen to set the church into its catholic (though not
necessarily Roman Catholic) tradition. These controversies, which at times
generated more heat than light, reached every level of the church, from the
bishop in the House of Lords down to the parson in his parish. The book looks at
the way in which men 'entered the church' and at the growing professionalism of
the clergy. Topics included range from the clerical incomes to clerical costume,
changing patterns of worship, and the pastoral work of clergymen in town and
country.
Contents:
The Victorian Church
Becoming a Clergyman
Incumbents and Curates
The Professionalisation of the Clergy
Worship, Preaching and Liturgy
Town Church and Cathedral Close
Further Reading
Places to Visit
