The Magisterial Reformation

I grew up fairly conservative Lutheran. I’ve spent a lot of time in Lutheran academic spaces. I went to a private Lutheran college for my Undergraduate; I have a Master of Divinity degree from a Lutheran seminary. Most of my close friends and mentors are Lutheran. I’ve read a lot of the primary sources when it comes to this tradition. In fact, my second masters, which I’m currently working on, is partly on Martin Luther’s theology of the Christian Life.

I’m a little newer to Anglicanism. I did not grow up Anglican. I took a class during my undergraduate on the English Reformation; I studied abroad in Cambridge and toured many Anglican Churches. And I attained a Master of Divinity from an Anglican Seminary (yes, it was a joint Lutheran-Anglican institution, so two degrees!). During that degree, I got to know some Anglican professors and students. And then I married my wife, who is an Anglican, and I started attending her Anglican Church. There, I’ve gotten to know some of the clergy and have taken some parish classes. I’ve read many of the major Reformation documents important to Anglican History and some books on Anglican Identity. I’ve gotten a little bit of the “feel” of Anglicanism. It’s different than the Lutheranism I grew up in. And it’s something that I’m happy to be a part of.

This all goes to say that, in some ways, I have feet in both worlds. I worship as an Anglican, with an Anglican ecclesiology and an Anglican emphasis on liturgical formation and the wideness of the Church. But I tend to have some of the classic emphases of Lutheran theology, with its emphasis on Sacramental Realism and Christology. And as I’ve sat in on both denominations’ catechetical formation classes, one thing has struck me again and again, so much so that I think it’s worth writing about.

Anglicans and Lutherans seem to have very little grasp of what it means to be a part of the Magisterial Reformation.

What do I mean by this?

Anglicans and Lutherans really don’t seem to know what to do with one another. Lutheran theology is very foreign to the way that Anglicans talk about their own identity. Most often, the diagram they use is of Rome as one extreme and Zwingli (or Baptists) as the other, and Anglicans as the via media, the middle way, which doesn’t fall into either extreme. For example, on the Lord’s Supper, Rome believes in Transubstantiation, Zwingli believes in Memorialism—therefore, Anglicans, as the middle way, find the proper balance between the two, holding to spiritual or real presence. On ecclesiology, Catholics believe in the Pope, Baptists believe in congregationalism, Anglicans believe in autocephalous bishoprics, the Anglican Communion. On the sources of theology, Catholics believe in two source theory, Baptists believe in Scripture, Anglicans believe in Scripture that is informed by both tradition and reason. This seems to be because of the narrative the Puseyites adopted—one of the ways that Anglo-Catholicism dramatically shapes Anglican Identity even today. Anglicanism is determined by its relation to Rome on the one hand and the Radical Protestants on the other. Anglicanism is like Rome and different than General Protestantism.

Lutherans tend to have similar rhetoric when they speak about their own denominational identity. Luther, of course, was the original Reformer, and, according to Charles Porterfield Krauth, his reformation was conservative. That is, it did not intend a clean break with Rome. It was not a rejection of what came before it—it was a reformation of what came before it. Early even in the Reformation, Luther himself adopted the rhetoric of the Papists on one side of him and the Schwarmerei, the radical reformers, everyone who wasn’t Lutheran basically, on the other side. On the one hand, Rome taught transubstantiation, that the bread was converted into Christ’s body in the Lord’s Supper; on the other, Zwingli, Karlstadt, Calvin, Bucer taught that Christ could not be bodily present in the Lord’s Supper, and so was either spiritually present or not present at all. Lutherans were the only ones who held to the clear and simple teaching of Scripture, that the bread was still bread and yet Christ was still bodily present. Or, Rome demanded obedience to the Pope, the Schwarmerei made the principle of the priesthood of all believers into a principle of social and ecclesial anarchy, but the Lutherans maintained that the Word of God was the sole authority and unity of the Church, and that the Church can be identified where the Gospel is purely taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered. On the sources of theology, Lutherans have often taught that Rome teaches the supremacy of Tradition, the Enthusiasts teach the supremacy of Experience, but the Lutherans teach the most sublime Evangelical Doctrine, that all matters in the Church must be decided by the Word of God in its clear and natural meaning.

It should be clear from all that that Anglicans and Lutherans actually tell very similar stories about themselves when they attempt to explain what is significant about their tradition. Via Media in some sense isn’t simply an Anglican thing; rather, both traditions place themselves between Rome on the one hand and the more radical reformation on the other. They both argue that their tradition is less excessive and more balanced than the alternatives. They are both “middle ways”—with, admittedly, important theological differences based on the Reformers the Churches decided to follow. I think, though, that this similarity of rhetoric is why Lutherans and Anglicans a lot of times don’t know what to do with each other: the justification of their respective denominational identities tends to work in binary categories that necessitate only their church being the authentic middle way, the real rational solution.

Anglicans don’t know what to do with Lutherans because Lutheran ecclesiology looks like the radical reformation, but its sacramentology looks like it belongs to Roman Catholicism. If the middle way in ecclesiology is autocephalous bishoprics, Lutheranism, especially American Lutheranism, is quite wide of the mark. The reimagining of the Church in terms of a spiritual fellowship contained in local congregations is not a representation of the Great Tradition—it’s a Reformation, or maybe even American innovation. In this sense, Lutherans look a lot like the Zwinglians and Separatists, traditions which radically revised the outward form and organization of the Church.

But on the other hand, Lutherans hold that Christ is truly present according to his body in the Lord’s Supper. And that’s not something that Zwinglians or Baptists believe. In fact, that’s what Anglicans tend to say Roman Catholics believe, whereas Anglicans tend to argue that Christ’s body is ad dextram Deo, at the Right Hand of the Father, and so is present in the Eucharist not bodily but spiritually. But how can Lutherans look like both the radical Reformation and the Roman Catholics at the same time? They simply don’t fit the binary.

The same thing happens when Lutherans try to fit Anglicans in this schema. Anglicans don’t believe that Jesus is bodily present in the Lord’s Supper. They believe in the spiritual presence, which means that they go in the Schwarmerei category, along with Calvin, Karlstadt, Zwingli, etc. And yet—yet Anglicans hold to the episcopal structure of the Church and the threefold office. And they like to situate themselves next to Rome, and dismiss the radical reformation as crazy innovators. So, maybe they should be considered Papists?

What is needed is a third category. And that category is “Magisterial Reformation.”

What is the Magisterial Reformation? In Reformation historiography, the Magisterial Reformation is often used to describe the similarities between the major Classical Reformation traditions: Lutherans, Calvinists, Anglicans, and Zwinglians. These traditions were not Roman Catholic, in so far as they were critical of certain developments in late Medieval scholasticism and popular piety. They were Reformed in that they found their inspiration for critique in the initial Wittenberg Reform. And all of them were Magisterial, in that they all had certain centers of activity that were supported and enforced by civil magistrates (Wittenberg, Geneva, Canterbury, and Zurich). These traditions did not advocate leaving society (such as the Anabaptists did) or revolting against the established order (as did the followers of Thomas Muentzer). Their reforms were often fairly conservative, in that they promoted their political leaders to be the primary agent in reforming their territories. And though there was significant disagreement individual theological points, they all share these family traits.

So then, the reason why Lutherans cannot figure out whether Anglicans are Roman Catholics or Enthusiasts is this: Anglicans are neither. They are part of the same family of Reformation movements as the Lutherans.

And the reason why Anglicans can’t quite figure out if Lutherans are Roman Catholic or Zwinglians? Lutherans also are neither. They are part of the same family as Anglicans, Calvinists, and Zwinglians (even if, yes, they reformed first).

I’m hoping that this post is the first in a series of posts about the family of traditions I’ve called the “Magisterial Reformation.” Each of these church bodies has similar family traits—while also standing out in what they emphasize in their particular formulation of doctrine. Getting a handle on these differences is just as important as getting a handle on their similarities—and we will see that each tradition negotiated the questions around reform differently, even though they did share a common set of questions. If we can see this in action, maybe we can acknowledge that there are other viable answers to reform out there, even if we wouldn’t personally go that way ourselves.

My hope is that by writing this series of posts, I can foster a little more understanding between traditions, so that on the ground level we can look at other traditions (and those that are a part of them!) and engage with them both honestly and fruitfully. The bottom line is: we don’t need to view each other as the enemy, or constantly justify our traditions simply by what they’re not. Instead, we can rejoice in the diversity of opinion, the manifold ways that God makes himself known and inspires the Church to love him. And in that diversity, we can also sift through the opinions of theologians and see what is helpful, what is harmful, what speaks the Christian tradition well and what obscures it on certain points. The Church has always held a diversity of opinions—by encountering them, it is my hope that we might be further formed into people that are discerning, honest, and charitable as we encounter the depths of Christian faith and practice.