A Personal Evaluation of the Oxford Movement

On 14 July 1833 (one hundred and eighty-nine years ago), the Reverend John Keble preached the Assize Sermon at the University Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Oxford. At the time, the sermon was delivered primarily to the legal community. The general thrust of this sermon was that secular parliamentary interference in the internal religious life of the Church was dangerous. 

Keble's sermon has often been considered the beginning of the Anglican phenomenon known as the Oxford Movement, Tractarianism, or the Catholic Revival. Like many historical events, the background and development of the Oxford Movement were complex. Political, cultural, and theological forces were at work. Even the men who participated in the early movement had differing perspectives, opinions, and strategies. The reactions of those outside the group of original participants were even more divergent. Some viewed the movement as the salvation of the English Church tradition. Some others viewed aspects of the movement as incompatible with Anglican history and doctrine.

My view of the Oxford movement is mixed. On the one hand, the Oxford Movement made important contributions. It rejected certain aspects of nineteenth-century secularism and the view that the English Church should merely be a bureaucracy of the state. There was an emphasis on worship, conviction, and mission. There was a renewed emphasis on liturgical orderliness and ecclesiastical arts. On the other hand, Tractarianism had weaknesses. Some in the Oxford Movement promoted unrealistic, romanticized, or untenable views of Anglican history and theology. Some Anglo-Catholics ignored the clear historical influences of the Reformation on basic Anglican worship and belief. Some promoted a naive, romanticized admiration of medieval and Tridentine Roman Catholic liturgy, devotion, and doctrine. Some were even misled by historically false papal claims.

In sum, the Oxford Movement was an important Christian response to 19th-century secularism. Although it was sometimes unrealistic in its historical views of the Anglican tradition, the movement was right to stress historical continuity, creedal orthodoxy, and the religious and spiritual mission of the Church. Like most movements in Church History, the Oxford Movement had its positive and negative aspects, but it cannot be denied that it was an important phase of Anglican development. The movement helped preserve and reassert the ancient catholic roots of the Anglican tradition and re-emphasize the importance of reverent liturgical worship. Even those Anglicans who downplay the value of the Oxford Movement have been influenced by it.