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With most studies of the seventeenth-century Church of England ending at 1642 or beginning at 1660, one could be forgiven for thinking that there could be no national church without episcopacy. Years between these dates are usually subject to isolated studies of particular issues - the failure to establish a new national Church, the rise of the radical sects, Anglican 'survivalism'. One institution, however, bridges the divide between the Laudian reformation of the 1630s and the restorations of the 1660s. This study focusses on the parishes within one administrative territory, the county of Somerset and diocese of Bath and Wells. The parochial churchwardens' accounts, a rich and continuous seam of evidence, are analysed to show the continued centrality of the parish in English religious practice, culture and government. They reveal a new perspective on old questions. What was the Laudian reformation, and why was it so successfully implemented? Why was it so controversial? Why did successive interregnum governments find it so hard to construct a new Church? Why was the Church of England so quickly restored after 1660? The parish emerges from this study as a uniquely durable and important institution, its existence the context within which the history of the English Church must be understood and explained. The humble men who served as churchwardens are revealed to have been significant instruments in religious governance, the effective utilization of them key to the success or failure of successive religious settlements.

This thesis aims to show how Hauerwas's ecclesiology, especially its critique of Constantinianism and liberal politics, offers a biblically defensible and christianly faithful way of being a church for the churches of the developed world, including Japan. The first part (Ch. 1-5) outlines a definition of the term Constantinianism as well as Hauerwas's counter-Constantinian theology. It clarifies one of the most frequently used terms by Stanley Hauerwas, Constantinianism, and sets out his counter-Constantinian ecclesiology (Ch. 1-4). Chapter five defends his position from one of its central critics and of the most ardent and robust Constantinian proponents, Peter Leithart, by showing how the kind of theology that pursues power and control in the world must do so by bypassing Jesus' servanthood as revealed in his death on the cross, and how this elision clouds the eyes of Christians and entices the church to renounce her obedience and faithfulness to her Lord for securing a safe haven for her in this world. The second half of the dissertation (Ch. 6-9) deploys these theological considerations in order to analyze Japanese Christianity and suggest that there are strong cultural trajectories named basso ostinato by Maruyama Masao that render Japanese churches especially vulnerable to Constantinian temptation. The concise Christian history narrated in Ch. 7-9 substantiates the relevancy of Maruyama's analysis and reveals how the Japanese church was turned into a docile servant of the Empire of Japan with merging the Lordship of Jesus Christ with that of tennō, the kingdom of God with the tennō's empire. I conclude that Hauerwas's warnings about Constantinianism remain pertinent today in reminding the Japanese church, along with all the churches of the developed world, that the business of the church is the creation of a new people who live out the politics of Jesus.

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This thesis studies the ranks of secular clergy and their changing career patterns in the diocese of Hereford between 1400 and 1535. This diocesan study will contribute to the developing research of the late medieval English clergy. The printed episcopal registers of Hereford are examined as the major source for the present thesis. Other additional records, for example, the Valor Ecclesiasticus of 1535, are also introduced as supplementary evidence. The study consists of five aspects relating to the clerical career in the late medieval diocese of Hereford. The changing patterns of clerical recruitment during the studied period are analysed in virtue of the calculation of acolytes and priests which were included in the ordination lists. The clerical movement across the diocesan boundaries in the phase of ordination is demonstrated through the calculation of letters dimissory held by ordinands. Various titles presented by individuals during the ordinations are categorised and analysed to indicate the different economic resources in the early stage of a clerical career. The other two aspects concern clerical careers after the ordination. The admission to a benefice is discussed through the analysis of the exercise of patronage regarding the parochial advowsons held by various patrons. The actual economic status of a parochial incumbent on the eve of the Reformation is demonstrated by the information extracted from the Valor Ecclesiasticus. Based on the analyses of this thesis, the clerical career still had its attractiveness in the pre-Reformation diocese of Hereford, and secular clergy was a rank with the activeness and significance within the late medieval church and had close connections with the contemporary secular society.

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This thesis considers aspects of contextualisation in the mission of local churches in twenty-first century Wales. Welsh Nonconformity rose rapidly to a dominant position in Welsh society and culture in the nineteenth century, but has subsequently declined equally rapidly. By the beginning of the twenty-first century its total demise is predicted. The research examines the contextual factors in this decline, and their relevance for possible recovery. Contextualisation is an essential part of missiology, in calibrating appropriate mission to the distinctives of a particular nation or locality. Wales is shown to be a distinctive context for mission, both nationally and regionally, in relation to specific aspects: religious, geographic, ethnic, linguistic, cultural, social and political. Contextual studies have been done for other mission contexts, but not for Wales. This research seeks to address this lack. The thesis first outlines the development of the main approaches in global mission, their underlying assumptions, and their outworking in the mission of local churches in the West. The approaches have been identified as Evangelistic, Lausanne, Missio Dei, Liberal and Emergent. Drawing on hundreds of questionnaire responses and extensive interviews with Nonconformist leaders, the research examines how the different approaches to mission have been expressed in Wales, and how each approach adjusted to each aspect of context. The growth trends of the different approaches, patterns of church and mission, and adjustments to Welsh contexts in the first decade of the twenty-first century, or not, are then examined. The resulting analysis enables good practice to be identified, and approaches for effective mission suggested for the coming decades.

The Thesis is in three parts and is concerned with providing an introduction to, and an analysis and text of the extant manuscript minutes of Sessions 45 to 73 of the Westminster Assembly of Divines 1640. These unpublished minutes are now deposited at the Dr. Williams Library, London, and are records of the debates of the Assembly while they were engaged in revising some of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion of the Church of England. The introduction to the text covers the Parliamentary activity which led to the calling of the Assembly, and deals with the relations of Parliament with Scotland, which gave so much direction to the work of the Assembly and led to the Solemn League and Covenant. The composition of the Assembly and the rules by which the Assembly was regulated, are also examined. The introduction concludes with an analysis of the discussions of the Assembly as recorded in the defined sessions. The second part of the thesis consists of an analysis of each session dealt with. This became necessary as each of the transcribed sessions was found to be difficult to understand as the scribe had employed a highly individual form of theological shorthand, and had missed out vital parts of complicated arguments. In the analysis most of the arguments of the original text have had to be amplified to make sense. The third part of the thesis comprises of the transcription of the text of the minutes. The original exists only in manuscript form, and the illegibility of some parts is exaggerated by the use of the unique theological shorthand of Adoniram Byfield, the scribe. In the transcription all punctuation and capitalization have been supplied though original spellings have been preserved. Though the transcription has been compared with that of Sir E.M. Thompson deposited at New College Library, Edinburgh, it has been necessary to depart from many of the interpretations of that transcription. There are three Appendices attached to the thesis, the first compares the revised and unrevised Articles dealt with in Sessions 45 yo 73. The second provides biographical information on continental authorities cited in debates. The third provided a bibliographical guide to those members who participated in the debates on the revision.