Anglican religious orders are communities of men or women (or in some cases mixed communities of men and women) in theAnglican Communion who live under a common rule of life. The members ofreligious orders takevows which often include the traditional monastic vows ofpoverty,chastity andobedience, or the ancient vow of stability, or sometimes a modern interpretation of some or all of these vows. Members may belaity orclergy, but most orders and their houses include a mixture of both. They lead a common life of work and prayer, sometimes on a single site, sometimes spread over multiple locations. About 2,400 monks and nuns are currently in the Anglican communion, about 55% of whom are women and 45% of whom are men.[1]
Though many Anglicans are members of religious orders recognized by the Anglican Communion, others may be members of ecumenical Protestant or Old Catholic religious orders while maintaining their Anglican identity and parochial membership in Anglican churches.
Members of religious communities may be known asmonks ornuns, particularly in those communities which require their members to live permanently in one location.Brother andSister are common forms of address across all religious communities. They may also be known asfriars orsisters, terms used particularly (though not exclusively) within religious orders whose members are more active in the wider community, often living in smaller group houses rather than in larger monastic or cloistered houses. Amongst such friars and sisters the descriptor termmendicant is sometimes applied to their orders: those whose members are geographically mobile and more focused on an outwardly-facing work or ministry (eg, with the poor).
The titlesFather andMother orReverend Father andReverend Mother are commonly applied to the leader of a community, or sometimes more generally to all members who have been ordained as priests or elected to leadership offices by the community.
In the Benedictine Anglican tradition the formal honorific titlesRight Reverend andVery Reverend are sometimes applied to theAbbot (leader) andPrior (deputy leader) of a religious community.[a] Benedictine communities sometimes apply the titlesDom andDame to professed male and female members (rather than Brother and Sister).
Religious orders were dissolved byKing Henry VIII when he separated theChurch of England from papal primacy. In 1626,Nicholas Ferrar, a protegé ofWilliam Laud (1573–1645), with his family, established theLittle Gidding community. Since there was no formal Rule (such as theRule of Saint Benedict), no vows taken, and no enclosure, Little Gidding cannot be said to be a formal religious community, like a monastery, convent, or hermitage. The household had a routine according tohigh church principles and theBook of Common Prayer. Fiercely denounced by thePuritans and denounced as "Protestant Nunnery" and as an "Arminian heresy", Little Gidding was attacked in a 1641 pamphlet entitled "The Arminian Nunnery".[2] The fame of the Ferrars and the Little Gidding community spread and they attracted visitors.King Charles I visited three times, including on 2 May 1646 seeking refuge after theCavalier defeat at theBattle of Naseby. The community ended when its last member died in 1657.
Although the Ferrar community remained a part of the Anglicanethos (Bishop Francis Turner composed a memoir of Nicholas Ferrar prior to his death in 1700),[3] not until the mid-nineteenth century with theOxford Movement and the revival of Anglican religious orders didLittle Gidding reach the consciousness of the average Anglican parishioner. Since that time, interest in such community life has grown, and not been limited to members of theAnglican Communion. According toascetical theologianMartin Thornton, much of the appeal is due to Nicholas Ferrar and the Little Gidding community's exemplifying the lack of rigidity (representing the best Anglicanism'svia media can offer) and "common-sense simplicity", coupled with "pastoral warmth", which are traceable to the origins of Christianity.[4]
Between 1841 and 1855, several religious orders for women were begun, among them theCommunity of St Mary the Virgin atWantage and theSociety of Saint Margaret at East Grinstead. Religious orders for men appeared later, beginning in 1866 with theSociety of St. John the Evangelist or "Cowley Fathers". In North America, the founding of Anglican religious orders began in 1842 with theNashotah Community for men inWisconsin, followed in 1845 by the Sisterhood of the Holy Communion underAnne Ayres inNew York.
In recent decades, religious orders have been remarkably grown in other parts of the Anglican Communion, most notably inTanzania,South Africa, theSolomon Islands,Vanuatu, andPapua New Guinea. About 2,400 monks and nuns are currently in the Anglican communion, about 55% of whom are women and 45% of whom are men.[1]
During the three centuries from dissolution to restoration some views expressed a desire for the restoration of the religious life within Anglicanism. In 1829 the poetRobert Southey, in hisColloquies (cxiii.), trusts that “thirty years hence this reproach also may be effaced, and England may have itsBeguines and itsSisters of mercy. It is grievously in need of them.”
Practical efforts were made in the religious households ofNicholas Ferrar atLittle Gidding, 1625, and ofWilliam Law atKing's Cliffe, 1743; and underCharles II, saysFr. Bede[clarification needed] in hisAutobiography, “about 12 Protestant ladies of gentle birth and considerable means” founded a short-lived convent, withWilliam Sancroft, thenDean of St Paul's, for director.
Southey's appeal had weight, and before the thirty years had passed, compassion for the needs of the destitute in great cities, and the impulse of a strong Church revival, aroused a body of laymen, among whom were includedWilliam Gladstone, Sir T. D. Acland, Mr A. J. Beresford-Hope, Lord Lyttelton and Lord John Manners (chairman), to exertions which restored sisterhoods to the Church of England. On 26 March 1845 the Park Village Community was set on foot in Regent's Park, London, to minister to the poor population of St Pancras. The “Rule” was compiled byEdward Pusey, who also gave spiritual supervision. In theCrimean War the superior and other sisters went out as nurses withFlorence Nightingale. The community afterwards united with the Devonport Sisters, founded by Miss Sellon in 1849, and together they form what is known as Ascot Priory. The St Thomas's sisterhood at Oxford commenced in 1847; and the mother-superior of theSociety of the Holy and Undivided Trinity Convent at Oxford,Marian Hughes, dedicated herself before witnesses to such a life as early as 1841.[5]
Four sisterhoods stand together as the largest: those ofClewer,Wantage,All Saints andEast Grinstead; and the work of the first may stand as a specimen of that of others. TheCommunity of St John Baptist at Clewer, near Windsor, arose in 1849 through the efforts of a Mrs Tennant and the vicar, afterwards warden of the society, the RevdT. T. Carter, to save "fallen women". Under the first superior,Harriet Monsell, the numbers steadily grew and at the beginning of the 20th century were over 200. Their services to society and the church include six houses for "fallen women", seven orphanages, nine elementary and high schools and colleges, five hospitals, mission work in 13 parishes and visiting in several “married quarters” of barracks. Many of these are notable institutions and their labours extend over a wide area; two of the settlements are in India and two in the United States. A list of 26 sisterhoods is given in theOfficial Year-Book of the C.E. (1900), to which may be added 10 institutions of deaconesses, many of whom live in community under a rule. In 1909 the number of women in religious orders in England was estimated as some 1300; whereas at the time of the dissolution under King Henry VIII there had only been 745.[6]
TheEpiscopal Church of Scotland has three sisterhoods and they are found also in Toronto, Saint John the Divine; Brisbane, Sacred Advent. TheYear-Book (1911) of theEpiscopal Church of America mentions 18 American sisterhoods and seven deaconess homes and training colleges.
Practically all Anglican sisterhoods originated in works of mercy and this largely accounts for the rapidity with which they have won their way to the good will and confidence of theChurch. Their number is believed to exceed 3,000, and the demand for their services is greater than the supply. Bishops are often their visitors, andChurch Congresses, Convocation andLambeth Conferences have given them encouragement and regulation. This change in sympathy, again, has gained a hearing from modern historians, who tend more and more to discredit the wholesale defamation of the dissolution period.
This charitable activity, however, distinguishes the modern sister from the nuns of primitive and medieval times, who were cloistered and contemplative, and left external works to deaconesses, or to laywomen of a third order, or to the freer societies like the Beguines.St Vincent de Paul is considered to have begun the new era with his institution of Sisters of Charity in 1634 . Another modern feature is the fuller recognition of family ties: Rule 29 of the Clewer sisters directs that the sisters shall have free intercourse with relations, who may visit them at any time. But in most essential respects modern sisterhoods follow the ancient traditions. They devote themselves to thecelibate life, have property in common, and observe a common rule of prayer, fellowship and work. Government is by a sister superior, assisted by various officers. The warden andchaplain are clergy, and the visitor is commonly a bishop.
Whilst there is no single central authority for all religious orders, and many member churches of the Anglican Communion have their own internal structures for recognizing and regulating religious orders, some central functions are performed by the Anglican Religious Communities department atChurch House, Westminster, the headquarters of theChurch of England,Church Commissioners,General Synod,Archbishops' Council, andNational Society. This department publishes the bi-annualAnglican Religious Life, a world directory of religious orders, and also maintains an official Anglican Communion website for religious orders.Anglican Religious Life defines four categories of community.[7]
In the United States of America, there is a clear distinction between "orders" and "communities", since theEpiscopal Church has its own two-fold definition of "religious orders" (equivalent to the first two groups above) and "Christian communities" (equivalent to the third group above).[b]TheAnglican Religious Life directory affirms this, stating "This distinction in not used in other parts of the Anglican Communion where[the term]communities is also used for those who take traditional vows."[8]
Some religious orders are unique to the Anglican Communion. Certain large orders, such as theSociety of Saint Margaret or theCommunity of the Sisters of the Church, are widespread and follow a rule of life written especially for the community. Other communities follow one of a number of historic rules predating the ecclesial divisions of theReformation era. These rules are followed by different orders which often have manifestations within different current Christian denominations, particularly (in most cases) Anglicanism, Roman Catholicism and Lutheranism and, in some cases, also Eastern Orthodoxy.
There are a number of Anglican communities of nuns following the Rule ofSt Augustine of Hippo. This rule has a particular focus on making all of one's thoughts and speech God-centred. There is no central Augustinian administration beyond the common rule.
The Benedictine order is active in all the Christian denominations mentioned above, including the Eastern Orthodox tradition. Within the Roman Catholic Church there is a centralBenedictine Confederation (notwithstanding the autonomy of each abbey) and the Anglican Benedictine orders maintain close relations with this central organisation (although without actual membership). The rule has a particular emphasis on community life, hospitality for strangers and achieving a proper balance of work, prayer and recreation.
Communities that follow theRule of St. Benedict, but aren't part of the Order of St. Benedict, include theOrder of Saint Helena.
The Carmelite Rule has found more limited use in the Anglican Communion than some others. TheCommunity of the Sisters of the Love of God in Oxford, England, are heavily influenced by Carmelite spirituality and follow elements of the Carmelite Rule, but their rule also has many other influences. TheEpiscopal Carmel of Saint Teresa inMaryland is a full expression of the Carmelite order and rule within Anglicanism, founded for that purpose with the support of the American House of Bishops. The sisters follow theDiscalced Carmelite rule and therefore use the post-nominal initials OCD.
Although a number of cloistered Cistercian orders have been founded within Anglicanism, none has proved enduring. The longest Cistercian experiment was the community ofEwell Monastery (1966 to 2004). Some Anglican communities follow an adapted form of the Cistercian Rule and a single member of the former Ewell Monastery lived as a Cistercian solitary until 2022. Since 2010 there exists the Order ofAnglican Cistercians who enjoy an ecumenical link with the Roman Catholic Cistercians.
TheAnglican Order of Preachers is a recognized "Christian Community" of the Episcopal Church in the United States and has spread to Canada, the United Kingdom and Europe, the Philippines, Australia and India. The friars and sisters live under a common rule of life and vows of simplicity, purity, and obedience. There are also Anglicans who are members of ecumenical and Old Catholic Dominican religious orders and priories.
TheOrder of Christ the Saviour is a dispersedDominican Order within the Episcopal Church, and an "Associate Community" of the National Association of Episcopal Christian Communities.[9][10] The Order is characterized by its unique blend ofThomistic scholarship and a dedicated focus ondeliverance ministry in the Anglican tradition. The Order embraces theRule of St. Augustine, guiding its members towards a life of prayer, community service, and frequent engagement with the sacraments. Membership in the Order is open to confirmed Anglican communicants in good standing and in communion with theSee of Canterbury.[11]
A number of Anglican religious orders follow the Rule ofSt Francis of Assisi, although theSociety of St. Francis is the largest and most widespread. The rule has a particular focus on poverty and identifying with the poor and the destitute as well as care of the environment and respect for all of creation.
TheVincentian Family of religious institutions founded by, or in the spirit of,Saint Vincent de Paul, is found within the Roman Catholic and Anglican traditions. In Anglicanism the main Vincentian Order for women is theSisters of Charity, and the main order for men is theCompany of Mission Priests. The rule has a particular emphasis on care for the poor and marginalised in society.
The following is a list of the religious orders in the Anglican Communion with their initials and locations:
In her autobiographical seriesCall the Midwife, British authorJennifer Worth portrayed her time working as a district nurse andmidwife in the East End of London in the late 1950s alongside theCommunity of St. John the Divine. In the books, and theBBC televisiondrama series of the same name, the order is renamed theSisters of St. Raymond Nonnatus.
The 1939novelBlack Narcissus byRumer Godden is about a group of Anglican Nuns (the Order of the Servants of Mary) who persist in trying to establish a religious community in the Palace of Mopu in theHimalayas,Nepal, despite the sisters feeling sexual repression and enduring forbidden love. Both the 1947 filmBlack Narcissus and the 2020miniseries of the same name were adaptations of the book.
.jpg)
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
