Defending the prayer book, Hooker cleverly turns the charge of papist back on the non-conformists. According to Targoff’s summary, “By depicting the use of sermons to distribute God’s word as an act of scriptural hoarding, Hooker aims to reverse the ‘papist’ label directed against the church for its seemingly Catholic practices: whereas the established churchmen embody the Protestant spirit by spreading God’s word through the reading of Scripture aloud, the non-conformists duplicate Catholic habits by subjecting the congregation to the... Read more

Tyndale distinguished true and false prayer in part by distinguishing the role of the body in each. False, hypocritical prayer, relies entirely on the body; hypocrites have “turned [prayer] into a bodily labor, to vex the tongue, lips, eyes, and throat with roaring, and to weary all the members.” This is what Jesus condemned in condemning the “babbling” of the hypocrites. True prayer is not un-bodily. But true prayer is easy on the body. In fact, instead of wearying the... Read more

We blame Descartes for the divided self of modernity, but perhaps we should blame Elizabeth I. In her book on the Book of Common Prayer, Ramie Targoff notes the limits of what Elizabeth demanded of her subjects: “so long as worshippers came to services on Sunday, they were free to believe whatever they chose.” Elizabeth, she notes, said she was reluctant to “make window’s in men’s souls.” “The vision of selfhood that emerges from this narrative,” she concludes, “depends upon... Read more

As you can see to the side, my little book on baptism is now available from Canon Press, just in time to give it a quick read before the PCA General Assembly. It’s short; it’s easy to read; and each copy helps to feed small children who are much cuter than I am. Read more