"The Church of England depends, for its existence, almost entirely on the solidarity and conservatism of the English ruling class. Its strength is not in anything supernatural, but in the strong social and racial instincts which bind the members of this caste together; and the English cling to their Church the way they cling to their King and to their old schools: because of a big, vague, sweet complex of subjective dispositions regarding the English countryside, old castles and cottages, games of cricket in the long summer afternoons, tea-parties on the Thames, croquet, roast-beef, pipe-smoking, the Christmas panto, Punch and the London Times and all those other things the mere thought of which produces a kind of warm and inexpressible ache in the English heart."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain (1948), p. 72
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Anglicanism
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Anglicanism
14 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Anglicanism →
Related Quotes
"I must tell you that I Abhor the principles of the Church of Rome as much as it is possible for any to do, and I as m…"
"The Anglican Church seems the Wonder Emporium of Mr Magorium."
"No thoughtful Churchmen will deny the existence of anomalies and defects which should be dealt with as soon as possib…"
"I have always impugned the Roman hierarchy, but I have never had the intention of opposing the ecclesiastical polity …"
"I have been baptised and educated in the Church of England; and have seen no cause to abandon that communion. ... I t…"
"The king's majesty desires nothing more than concord...; he knows there are those who would stir up strife, and that …"
"A wise Government, allying itself with religion, would, as it were, consecrate society and sanctify the State. But ho…"
"The concept of our established Church is occasionally misunderstood and, I believe, commonly under-appreciated. Its r…"
"[T]he Anglican Church...was at the heart of England's – and so Britain's – separation from the Roman Catholic, supran…"
"Having myself been a priest of the Church of England, and knowing... the disputes as to whether that Church really ha…"