The Oxford Movement -- Anglicans and Catholics in the 19th Century [45min]

Cardinal John Henry Newman is perhaps the most significant Christian theologian of the nineteenth century. He began as an evangelical, becoming a High Anglican before converting to Roman Catholicism in 1845. His is the story of the diversity of Victorian religious life. But his path also marks the waning of the ideas of Protestant nationhood at the close of the eighteenth century and the reaffirmation of the Catholic tradition at the turn of the twentieth century. For over a decade, between 1833 and 1845, Newman and his fellow travellers, the Oxford Movement, argued that the Church of England was a holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. They sought to assert the Catholic nature of their Church just as secularism, liberalism, non-conformism, and even Roman Catholicism, seemed to threaten her. They published tracts, preached and brought their social mission to some of the poorest urban parishes. Why between 1833 and 1845 was the voice of reaction such a loud one? What was the Oxford Movement and what motivated them? How did they present their ideas to the Anglican clergy at large and what did the clergy make of them? And why did they leave such a powerful legacy for the Church of England, its character and its churches? Host Melvyn Bragg investigates the history of ideas and debates their application in modern life with his guests Sheridan Gilley, Emeritus Reader in Theology at the University of Durham; Frances Knight, Senior Lecturer in Church History at the University of Wales, Lampeter; and Simon Skinner, Fellow and Tutor in History at Balliol College, Oxford. Baron Bragg -- historian, journalist and novelist -- is Controller of Arts for London Weekend Television.