St Mark's Church
Half a Millennium of Change
The seemingly ageless peace in the church today belies the fact that, like any other church of similar age, this one has seen some 500 years of sometimes tumultuous and destructive change and those changes must have been reflected in the architecture, decoration and ornaments of the church and also in the character of worship there. Although we know a good deal about the changes that took place over the last 150 years or so, for the remainder of the church’s history we can but guess on the basis of the religious developments that form an inescapable part of English history.
For its first 300 years or so there may indeed have been a sense of constancy and permanence in the church but that would all be changed by the Reformation. At the start of the 16th century this was, of course, a Roman Catholic church with all the usual trappings of rood screen, censers, pyx, statues and rich decoration. At the high altar the priest in full vestments would have celebrated the Mass with his back to the congregation.
The changes brought about by Henry VIII might not have had much effect on this situation for they were more concerned with governance than liturgy or the manner of worship; indeed Pope Leo X awarded Henry the title “Defender of the Faith” for his rebuke to Luther, in support of the seven sacraments and Henry remained a Roman Catholic until his death.
Since the earliest times the church in England had been distinctly different from the continental model and this difference had been emphasised in 1215 when Magna Carta rejected foreign, and particularly Papal, interference in English affairs. Henry’s matrimonial difficulties finally brought matters to a head and resulted in the Act of Supremacy in 1534 - an early Brexit underlining the historically English desire to be left alone to get on with things without being dictated to by foreign powers, rather than any fundamental disagreement over religious doctrine.
The first real changes came in 1547 on the death of Henry and the accession of the nine-year-old Edward VI with the Duke of Somerset as Protector. There followed removal of vestments and altar dressings, the destruction of images, the banning of processions, candles and incense.
After the fall of Somerset, the Duke of Northumberland with the support of Edward, now 14, introduced an even more rigid form of Protestantism, including an order to replace the altar with a communion table set up in the chancel.
When Edward died in 1553 and Mary became queen all these changes were sharply put into reverse and Catholicism returned with a bloody vengeance, including the restoration of the high altar, images, vestments and the full panoply of the Roman Mass. However after only another six years Mary died and the Protestant Elizabeth came to the throne, restoring some order after the chaos of Edward and Mary. The country church in Elizabeth’s time might have been the same externally but inside there would be an absence of images, the plain whitewashed walls decorated only with biblical texts. The font would be in its usual place and if there was still a screen separating nave from chancel it would be smaller and over it the Royal Arms replaced the rood. The Holy Table stood in the chancel, usually against the east wall, covered with a linen cloth and with the Ten Commandments suspended above. It would be brought forward into the body of the chancel for celebration of Communion but in the more Puritan parishes it remained there the whole time with seats round it where Communion was taken sitting down. A new feature was the pulpit, in the body of the nave, from which the minister conducted the service more or less amongst the congregation rather than in isolation in the sanctuary.
Under James, now James I of England as well as James VI of Scotland, and Charles I who followed, the pendulum began to swing back; the altar was again raised up and railed-in in the sanctuary, and all the appurtenances of the sacrament were restored in accordance with the Ornaments Rubric in the Book of Common Prayer imposed by Charles. This did not last, for the Scottish Calvinists and Presbyterians who had come south with James made common cause with the English Puritans, which led ultimately to the Civil War, regicide and the Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell. As early as 1643 Parliament demanded the destruction of candles and plate on communion tables and two years later vestments, screens, fonts and altars were added to the list of things to be destroyed.
After the Restoration in 1660 the tide turned again and altar rails enclosing raised altars covered with a rich cloth and on which stood candlesticks and plate all made a return. The reredos with its Ten Commandments, Lord’s Prayer and Creed became increasingly elaborate in decoration and painted altarpieces appeared. The Royal Arms, signifying the supremacy of the state, remained prominent over the chancel arch.
There then followed another period of relative continuity through the so-called “long eighteenth century”, a period beginning before the end of the 17th century and continuing until well into the 19th, by the end of which huge numbers of churches were in a terrible state of disrepair and the Church of England itself was suffering a crisis brought on by the growing freedom for Dissenters and the emancipation of Roman Catholics.
Then, with the Victorian age, came a further upheaval and while this did not have the profound effect on people’s lives that the Reformation and Counter-Reformation had, it was hugely significant for church architecture and furnishing. The Ecclesiological Society, founded originally in 1839 as the Cambridge Camden Society, in its journal The Ecclesiologist declared that Gothic architecture, particularly the mid-14th century Decorated style, was the only true Christian style and rich landowners all over the country put these ideas into practice with new or completely rebuilt churches furnished and decorated according to the Ecclesiological Society’s principles. At the same time the associated Oxford Movement, also known as Tractarianism after a series of essays called Tracts for the Times published between 1833 and 1841, was instrumental in introducing liturgical changes aimed at reinstating a more Roman style of worship based on that which prevailed in 1549, before the purges of Edward VI and Northumberland took effect.