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Sermons on the failure of Protestantism and on Catholicity
Sermons on the failure of Protestantism and on Catholicity Author:Ferdinand Cartwright Ewer Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: III. THE ANGLICAN CHURCH FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT FROM THE PROTESTANT SECTS. "The Church of the Living God."—1 Tim. iii. IS. It is the popular impression... more » that the Anglican Church took Her rise about three hundred years ago, in the days of King Henry the Eighth. She is believed to have been a creature of the Reformation, and is therefore regarded as one of the great sisterhood of the Protestant sects. She is looked upon as agreeing with those sects in all fundamental respects, and differing merely on subordinate points. It is supposed that, to a Protestant foundation, She merely superadds such matters of taste as written prayers instead of extemporaneous, the observance of certain festivals and fasts, the use of clerical garments, a preference for Gothic architecture, and for a ministry in the three orders of Bishop, Priest, and Deacon. To the inquiry, How the Church differs from the Protestant denominations about her? such points as the above mentioned would be specified in reply. It is not at all imagined that fundamentally we are not with the Protestant, but with the great Catholic world.It is not at all imagined that the difference between us and all Protestant bodies is not superficial, but radical and irreconcilable. But, Brethren, there are certain signs of the times that are very noteworthy. Why is it that, as the Protestant denominations are mutually drawing together, and seeking coalescence in union meetings and the interchange of pulpits, our Church stands aloof from the movement? Why is it, that if any of our Clergy, however few, coquet with the movement, the great body of our communicants, both lay and clerical, rise in indignation? Why is it, too, that, as this mutual gravitation is taking place among the systems of Protestantism, there is, on the other han...« less