This book examines the history, theology and liturgy of the Eucharist in the Anglican Church of Australia from its earliest foundation after the arrival of British settlers in 1788 to the present.
For more than half a century, the Anglican Diocese of Melbourne was unquestionably the most rigorously evangelical and missions-oriented diocese in Australia. The Diocese of Sydney, in that same period, was decidedly broader in theological and liturgical practice. How and why did Melbourne move in one direction, while Sydney in the other? This study suggests that the answers are to be found in four vital contributors: local churches, evangelical societies, theological colleges, and diocesan bishops. For three broad periods of history between 1847 and 1937, the presence of these four contributors is uncovered, described, and evaluated for the Diocese of Melbourne. Evangelical activism, theological reflection, and leadership are each shown in their contemporary contexts to help us understand how people with gospel passion sought to respond faithfully to their times. This is the question of vision, leadership, and strategy at the heart of this study: "What makes for long-term evangelical continuity over a hundred-year period?"
Sir Redmond Barry was the pre-eminent figure in Melbourne of the middle years of last century. A Supreme Court judge for thirty years, he was the founding and sustaining force behind the University of Melbourne, the Supreme Court Library, the Public Library, the National Gallery and the Museum. As social and cultural benefactor, he stands alone. Paradox pervaded his life. While seen by many as a hidebound, even villainous judge, his trust in the rule of law underpinned, for example, an unusually sympathetic and active response to the Aboriginal people. Yet fear of losing social standing and his Irish family's esteem blinkered him to injustice on his own doorstep. The story of his unacknowledged relationship of thirty years with Louisa Barrow, and of their four illegitimate children, is perplexing and often painful in the telling. This important biography is long overdue.
This book contains a series of essays based on previously published articles but all revised and updated. One on the founding of the university of Sydney has been totally re-written. They deal with the cultural and political tsunami that swept over the British empire and especially the colonies in Australia in the middle of the nineteenth century. The effects on those changes continue to this day for both church and state. The recent debates on marriage and religious freedom have about them the marks of these nineteenth century changes. Not all is simple continuity. State aid for independent schools initiated by Robert Menzies but carried to enormous lengths by his successors to this day actually turned the nineteenth century resolution totally on its head. The issues in these essays turn of the collapse of the English Christendom version of church state relations. The implications of that long running change are still central to the stuttering re-thinking by Anglicans of what it means to be a church in Australia in the twenty first century. That struggle has its analogues in the broader culture and nation as it tries to find a way to be Australia.