Tractarian Male Friendships, Intimacies, and Identities in Nineteenth-Century England
This thesis examines the Oxford Movement through the lenses of friendships and intimacies; which, I contend, were at the centre of the Tractarian Movement because of the way in which the chronologies of these friendships point towards an earlier starting point for the Oxford Movement and because of the way in which intimate friendships influenced the development of Tractarian theologies and identities. From among the first generation of Tractarian historians, such as R. W. Church and William Palmer, the story of the Oxford Movement has been about friends and friendships united against the perceived evils of rationalism and liberalism. The Tractarian project was to reassert the authority of the Church of England by re-awakening it to its own inherited catholicity – that is, its apostolic roots, its liturgical continuity with the ancient and medieval Christian Church, and its adherence to the traditionally and universally accepted doctrines of the church catholic. The friendships which shaped the Movement influenced the development of Tractarian doctrines and readings of history, confirming their understanding of the English Church. The strength and importance of Tractarian friendships to the development of the Movement have long been a topic of historical enquiry. The current scholarly discourse leaves historians of Tractarianism with a set of problems: how, suddenly, did a group of men realise they shared the same preoccupations about the state of the Church of England in 1833 and band together to articulate a transformative vision for the Church; why did those who remained in the Anglican fold suddenly stop having those preoccupations after 1845; why did some Tractarians find their intellectual and moral developments landed them in the Roman fold and others remained content within the Anglican Communion; what is the relationship between Tractarianism and Anglo-Catholicism—particularly the Anglo-Catholicism of the late-nineteenth century and early-twentieth century which seems to have grown out of Tractarianism, yet bears little connection to the project as it “ended” in 1845? It is the purpose of this doctoral thesis to answer these questions by re-locating Tractarian friendships outside of a Newman-centred narrative. Furthermore, this study has implications for the broader discipline because of the way in which Tractarianism and the Oxford Movement have been used within the context of histories of nineteenth-century friendship, intimacy, gender, and sexualities. It is my argument that Tractarian male friendships, intimacies, and identities should be examined through the lens of their theological and cultural context and that such a study illuminates the history of intellectual and theological development within the Oxford Movement and thus revises the chronology of the Oxford Movement and lays the groundwork for future studies within post-Tractarian Anglo-Catholicism.
Anglo-Catholicism, Ecclesiastical History, Edward Bouverie Pusey, Friendship, Isaac Williams, John Henry Newman, John Keble, Male Friendship, Oxford Movement, Richard Hurrell Froude, Tractarian
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