Glorious Companions: Five Centuries of Anglican Spirituality

The book covers major Anglican theologians from Bishop Thomas Cranmer to Bishop Desmond Tutu. It is well written and asks very good study questions at the end of each chapter. It includes short excerpts from their writings.

A good idea, but a rather disappointing achievement. There's very little to sink one's teeth into here. Mere snippets from 29 Anglican authors' writings are offered. None of them are longer than a third of a page, many of them are no more than 2 or 3 sentences. As a consequence, the reader doesn't get "Five Centuries of Anglican Spirituality" so much as "300 pages of Anglican quotes." Quotations are tricky things. If they're epigrams or one-liner witticisms--the kind of stuff Oscar Wilde, for example, churned out--they can stand alone. But quotations that are taken from larger works, particularly theological and spiritual ones, rarely do well apart from their contexts. They may provide raw material for lectio divina or meditative prayer. But they hardly give an idea of the depth or breadth of Anglican spirituality. It's all well and good, for example, to know that Dorothy Sayers wrote that "It is curious that people who are filled with horrified indignation whenever a cat kills a sparrow can hear that story of the killing of God told Sunday after Sunday and not experience any shock at all" (p. 273). But what does this quotable quote, which first appeared in the Introduction to Sayers' "The Man Born To Be King," actually mean? Read by itself, it's a commonplace, almost trite observation. It's only Sayers' reflections on this strange indifference to the killing of God, as well as her thoughts on scriptural "realism"--all of which Schmidt omits--that makes the passage worth attending to.

Next to the Bible, Glorious Companions is the best book our adult study class has ever used. There are twenty-nine chapters covering the period from Thomas Cranmer to Desmond Tutu, including theologians and missionaries, radicals and conservatives, fervent social activists and stunning poets, people of great spiritual calm and believers deep in spiritual anguish. Whether your class is made up of birth churchmen or folks who just moved into town and found your church, you and they will have wonderful ideas and exemplary Christian lives to ponder and discuss, and a long list of readings for everyone to follow up with.

Don't miss this even if you've never studied Anglicanism before. The author is an exquisite writer, and even with occasional doses of essential sixteenth-century writing, the book is an actual page-turner. You won't regret getting it.

I was so impressed the condition of the book---it looked just like the new one I had purchased several days prior.

I believe Father Schmidt has given us the most complete compendium of the great Anglican thinkers, writers and theologians in an easy to understand and very accesible volume. His inclusion of some of the highlights of "the actual words" of each author is brilliant. The study questions that follow each chapter also make this a great resource for study groups and parishes. It is a true collection of historical and theological treasures.

Excellent collection of essays

As a concept, "Glorious Companions" rates five stars. In execution, it occasionally falls to three. So let me give it four stars and say at the start I recommend the book highly, although with several caveats."Glorious Companions," a selection of the Episcopal Book Club, is a anthology or compendium into the hearts and minds of twenty-nine significant figures in Anglican spirituality. Proceeding chronologically, the author, Fr. Richard Schmidt, begins with Thomas Cranmer, the father of the Book of Common Prayer, and ends with Desmond Tutu, the prophet of forgiveness. In between, he covers figures as representative and as diverse as Richard Hooker, John Donne, Joseph Butler, Charles Gore, Dorothy Sayers, C.S. Lewis, and Verna Dozier. Some of his choices are inspired; it was a delight to see Samuel Johnson, a powerful writer whose writings on spirituality are largely unknown. Others, however, seemed arbitrary. Why Hannah More, for instance, but not Florence Nightingale? William Law but not William Laud? Thomas Traherne but not Benjamin Whichcote? Why Madeleine L'Engle over T.S. Eliot or W.H. Auden?An especially strong feature of the book is its excellent Introduction. Schmidt writes his introductory essay as a road map not just to his book, but to spirituality, Anglicanism, and theological imagery as well. Each of the twenty-nine sections of the book are divided into four parts: an ink drawing of the subject by Dean Mosher; a short spiritual biography of the author; a selection of passages from the subject's writings; and questions for reflection and discussion to be used by study groups.Generally Schmidt does a good job of placing his subjects in their historical, literary, and spiritual contexts and selecting appropriate passages for consideration and edification. But he can misstep on occasion. The section on John Donne was a disappointing example of these lapses. Schmidt focused more on Donne as a preacher of sermons than as a major English poet. Donne's poetry is difficult, but to ignore it in favor of his lesser talents is a lost opportunity for real spiritual discovery.

Lovely book. Lots of quotes. Sends you to the sources.

A great guide and resource for those of us who glory in these things.