The Westminster Confession of Faith and Its Incompatibility with Anglicanism
Part 1: The Westminster Confession of Faith and Anglican Theology in the Context of the English Civil War.
Introduction:
The Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF), often celebrated as one of the crowning achievements of Reformed Protestantism, arose from a specific historical and theological context that shaped its character and purpose. Drafted during the English Civil War (1642–1651), it was designed to articulate a cohesive theological framework for the emerging Presbyterian Church and to establish a unifying standard for England, Scotland, and Ireland. While the WCF has been lauded for its clarity and rigor, its theological and ecclesiological principles diverge significantly from Anglican theology.
This article, as part of a broader series, argues that the WCF is fundamentally incompatible with Anglicanism, not only in its doctrinal specifics but also in its overall ethos. Anglicanism, with its commitment to the via media, emphasizes sacramental theology, episcopal governance, and liturgical continuity. The WCF, by contrast, embodies a sectarian vision rooted in the majority of the Puritan’s rejection of these principles. Furthermore, the Confession’s covenant theology, rigid predestinarian framework, and rejection of episcopacy stand in direct opposition to the broader traditions of the early Church, exposing its theological deficiencies.
To fully understand the WCF’s incompatibility with Anglicanism, we must first examine its historical context, its role as a national document, and its impact during the English Civil War. Along the way, we will explore its opposition to the theological vision of King Charles I and Archbishop William Laud, both of whom championed an Anglicanism deeply rooted in the catholic and apostolic tradition.
The Historical Context of the Westminster Confession:
The WCF was born out of the English Civil War, a conflict that was as much theological as it was political. The war was marked by deep divisions between the Royalists, who supported King Charles I and the Church of England, and the Parliamentarians, many of whom were influenced by Puritan ideology. For the Parliamentarians, reforming the church was integral to their broader political goals.
In 1643, the Westminster Assembly was convened by the English Parliament to draft a new confession of faith that would interpret the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England1. This effort was tied to the Solemn League and Covenant, an agreement with the Scots to adopt Presbyterianism in exchange for their military support against the Royalists.2 The WCF thus became a tool of political expediency, designed to secure a military alliance and impose religious uniformity.
The Confession’s primary aim was to reform the Church of England and and unite the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland in religious manners. The most debated topic was church polity.3 Its authors believed that such uniformity would bring peace to a nation fractured by religious and political strife. Most of the Assembly members favored Presbyterian church governance, which involved elected assemblies of both lay and clerical representatives, although many were not firmly attached to it as a doctrinal position.4 However, this vision of unity was fundamentally flawed.
Central to Puritan thought and debated vigorously within the Assembly was the doctrine of predestination. Many of the divines adhered to the doctrine of particular redemption, teaching that Christ’s death was only intended to save those whom God had predestined for salvation. However, a minority, including Edmund Calamy, argued for hypothetical universalism, the idea that Christ’s death offered salvation to all, contingent on belief. While the Westminster Confession did not explicitly endorse this view, scholars debate whether its language leaves room for a hypothetical universalist interpretation.
Covenant theology, a significant development during this period, became the interpretive framework of the Assembly. The Confession outlined two major covenants: the covenant of works and the covenant of grace. The covenant of works “wherein life was promised to Adam, and in him to his posterity, upon condition of perfect and personal obedience.”5 While the covenant of grace: “freely offereth unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith in him, that they may be saved; and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto life his Holy Spirit, to make them willing and able to believe.”6
Ultimately and finally, the divines were vehemently opposed to William Laud and his followers, whom they saw as aligned with Catholicism.7 Before the Civil War, they considered Laud’s influence one of the greatest threats to the Church, though with the rise of radical sectarian movements, they focused more on groups such as the antinomians—those who rejected the moral law’s applicability to Christians—viewing them as a more immediate danger. By privileging a narrow theological perspective, the WCF alienated large portions of the population, particularly the High Church Anglicans who remained loyal to the Church of England’s sacramental and liturgical heritage
The Role of King Charles I and Archbishop Laud:
King Charles I and Archbishop William Laud stood as defenders of the Anglican vision of the Church, which was rooted in the catholic and apostolic tradition. For Charles, the Church of England was not merely a national institution but a divine organism. He viewed episcopal governance and liturgical worship as essential to the spiritual and political unity of the kingdom. His commitment to the divine right of kings further reinforced his belief that the monarchy and the Church were inseparably linked.
Archbishop Laud, as Charles’ chief ecclesiastical advisor, implemented reforms that emphasized the "beauty of holiness" in worship. His policies sought to restore the sacramental and liturgical richness of Anglicanism, countering the Puritan emphasis on austerity. Laud’s efforts included the restoration of church altars, the use of vestments, and the promotion of ceremonial practices. These reforms were met with fierce resistance from Puritans, who saw them as a return to “popish” practices. The Reverend Lucius Waterman in 1912 summed up William Laud’s contribution to Anglicanism best when he observed:
"That we [Anglicans] have our Prayer Book, our Altar, even our Episcopacy itself, we may, humanly speaking, thank Laud …… That our Articles have not a Genevan sense tied to them and are not an intolerable burden to the Church, is due to Laud. ….. . Laud saved the English Church …… The English Church in her Catholic aspect is a memorial to Laud.”
Archbishop William Laud, was a tireless defender of the Church of England’s catholicity and liturgical integrity, recognized the dangers posed by an over-reliance on Calvin’s theology, particularly among the young and impressionable. Writing in 1635, he observed:
“I do not deny but that Calvin's Institutions may profitably be read, and as one of their first books for divinity, when they are well grounded in other learning; but to begin with it so soon, I am afraid doth not only hinder them from all grounds of judicious learning, but also too much possess their judgments before they are able to judge, and makes many of them humourous in, if not against the Church.” 8
Laud warns against the premature exposure of students to Calvin's Institutes, noting that such exposure risks cultivating a narrow, sectarian mindset that undermines the Church’s unity. The Puritan insistence on doctrinal rigidity and their suspicion of tradition made them "humorous in, if not against the Church," incapable of appreciating the theological breadth and sacramental depth of Anglicanism.
The Book of Common Prayer (BCP), particularly its 1662 edition, serves as a testament to the Anglican vision championed by Charles and Laud. The preface to the BCP underscores its purpose to “maintain uniformity in worship,” reflecting the Church of England’s commitment to liturgical continuity and theological balance. The prayer book’s emphasis on sacramental worship, daily prayer, and the unity of the Church stands in stark contrast to the theological minimalism of the WCF.
For Laud, the Puritan disdain for tradition was not just a theological error but a practical threat to the Church’s ability to maintain decency and order. In a 1638 letter to the vice-chancellor of Oxford University, he defended the role of customs in preserving the Church’s integrity:
“[W]e find, that besides articles and canons and rubrics, &c., the Church of Christ had ever certain customs which prevailed in her practice, and had no canon for them; and if all such may be kicked out, you may bid farewell to all decency and order. In the meantime I will acquaint his majesty with this distemper growing, that the blame may not be cast upon me.”9
This defense of custom illustrates Laud’s broader argument that the Church’s practices, even those not explicitly mandated by canon law, are essential for maintaining reverence and continuity. The Puritan push to “kick out” such customs in the name of reform was, in Laud’s view, an attack on the Church’s very essence.
The Westminster Confession as a National Document
Ironically, the WCF was envisioned as a unifying document for a divided kingdom. However, its role as a national confession reveals its profound shortcomings. By aligning itself with a specific theological and ecclesiastical vision, the WCF alienated those who did not share its Calvinist and Presbyterian principles. Ironically, despite being a consensus document, it did not take the consensus of all those that were apart of the Church of England.
The abolition of episcopacy, a cornerstone of the Church of England’s identity, was central to the WCF’s agenda. The Confession’s authors rejected the idea of apostolic succession, viewing it as an unbiblical innovation. This stance was not only a departure from Anglican theology but also from the broader traditions of the early Church. As St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote, “Where the bishop is, there is the Church,” a principle that underscores the centrality of episcopal governance in Christian history.
The insistence on Presbyterian polity and the imposition of Calvinist doctrine further deepened divisions within English society. The Confession’s rigid predestinarian framework and minimalist sacramental theology contrasted sharply with the Anglican understanding of the sacraments [will be touched upon in the future looking at several sources]. These theological differences were not merely academic but had real-world consequences, as Anglican clergy and laity faced persecution for their adherence to the Church of England’s practices.
The English Civil War and the Failure of the WCF:
Far from achieving its goal of national unity, the WCF became a source of division. The Parliamentarian forces, driven by Puritan ideology, sought to dismantle the traditional structures of both church and state. However, their efforts to impose religious uniformity through the Confession proved futile.
The persecution of Anglicans during this period underscores the Confession’s sectarian nature. Churches were desecrated, liturgical worship suppressed, and sacred art destroyed. The Confession’s rigid theology left little room for the diversity of expression that characterized the Church of England’s liturgical and theological heritage.
The Westminster Confession of Faith was not born in a vacuum of pious theological reflection. It emerged as the creed of a Puritan movement that was willing to desecrate churches, persecute clergy, and even spill royal blood in its quest to destroy the Church of England and impose a narrow, sectarian Calvinism. The execution of King Charles I, an act of regicide unparalleled in English history, revealed the depths of the Puritan movement's cruelty and its rejection of the Anglican vision of a church grounded in apostolic order, sacramental life, and liturgical beauty.
The Collect for the Martyrdom of King Charles I, preserved in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer, captures the Anglican response to this atrocity with striking clarity:
O most mighty God, terrible in thy judgements, and wonderful in thy doings toward the children of men, who in thy heavy displeasure didst suffer the life of our gracious Sovereign King Charles the First, to be, as this day, taken away by the hands of cruel and bloody men: we thy sinful creatures here assembled before thee, do, in the behalf of all the people of this land, humbly confess, that they were the crying sins of this nation, which brought down this heavy judgement upon us. 10
Here, the Puritans are unequivocally condemned as "cruel and bloody men" whose actions defiled not only the monarchy but also the Church they sought to remake in their image. This prayer does not merely lament the loss of the king; it frames his death as a divine judgement on a nation led astray by sectarian violence. The Puritan revolution is exposed for what it truly was: a theological and political crusade that prioritized ideological purity over Christian charity and unity.
The WCF itself was born out of this spirit of zealotry. Conceived as the doctrinal foundation of a Presbyterian polity, it represented the Puritan vision of a “Reformed” Church that systematically rejected the catholicity of the Church of England. The rigid Calvinist theology dismantled the sacramental richness of Anglican worship, replacing the mystery and beauty of the liturgy with a cold, intellectualized faith. Its authors, emboldened by their political dominance, sought not dialogue or reconciliation but the wholesale eradication of Anglican theology and practice.
The Puritan Goal: Theological Uniformity Through Violence
The Puritan movement's disregard for the sacred is further illustrated by its campaign of violence against the Church of England. Anglican clergy were ejected from their parishes, altars were smashed, stained glass windows were shattered, and holy relics were destroyed—all in the name of purging "idolatry" and enforcing Calvinist orthodoxy. These actions, which the Puritans justified as necessary reforms, revealed their willingness to desecrate what previous generations had held as sacred.
The execution of Charles I, however, represented the ultimate desecration. By killing their king, the Puritans rejected the Anglican doctrine of the divine right of kings and sought to extinguish the sacramental vision of the monarchy. Charles I was not merely a political figure; he was the defender of a Church that maintained apostolic succession, episcopal governance, and the unity of Word and Sacrament. His death was not just regicide but an attack on the very heart of Anglican identity.
One of the clearest expressions of this sacred authority was the royal ritual of Touching for the King’s Evil11, a practice that emphasized the monarch’s role as a channel of divine grace. The liturgical rubric for this ceremony underscores the sacred nature of the monarch’s office:
"Then shall the infirm persons, one by one, be presented to the Queen upon their knees; and as every one is presented and while the Queen is laying her hands upon them, and putting the gold about their necks, the Chaplain that officiates, turning himself to her Majesty, shall say these words following:
" O GOD give a blessing to this work; and grant that these sick persons on whom the Queen lays her hands may recover, through Jesus Christ our Lord." 12
This act, where the monarch laid hands on the sick and bestowed a token of healing, was far more than a gesture of charity. It signified the king or queen’s divine vocation to mediate God’s blessings to their subjects. By invoking the name of Christ, the chaplain affirmed that the healing power flowed not from the monarch’s humanity but from their sacred anointing and their role as God’s representative on earth.
As the Collect continues from the above for the prayer of St. King Charles the Martyr, it underscores the guilt of the Puritan cause:
But, O gracious God, when thou makest inquisition for blood, lay not the guilt of this innocent blood, the shedding whereof nothing but the Blood of thy Son can expiate, lay it not to the charge of the people of this land: nor let it ever be required of us, or our posterity.
This plea for mercy reflects a recognition that the Puritans’ actions left a stain not only on their own consciences but on the nation as a whole. Their campaign for a Calvinist theocracy, epitomized by the WCF, stands condemned as a betrayal of the Church’s catholic and apostolic foundations.
Far from being a unifying document, the WCF was the theological expression of a movement that had plunged England into chaos. It sought to enforce doctrinal uniformity by erasing the richness and diversity of Anglican theology and liturgy. Its rigid covenant theology and rejection of episcopal governance reflect a sectarian agenda fundamentally at odds with the catholicity and historicity of the Church of England.
The WCF’s Puritan authors aimed to legitimize their violence by codifying their vision of the Church. Yet their confession was inseparable from the bloodshed and division they unleashed upon the nation. The Anglican Church, grounded in the sacramental life and guided by the episcopate, could never accept such a narrow and divisive vision.
The Anglican response to the Puritan revolution was not only a defense of theological integrity but also a witness to the enduring power of grace, beauty, and order in the face of cruelty and chaos.
Conclusion:
While, the Westminster Confession of Faith is significant within its own context, represents a theological and ecclesiastical vision fundamentally at odds with Anglicanism. Its rejection of episcopal governance, sacramental theology, and liturgical continuity places it outside the bounds of the catholic and apostolic tradition upheld by the Church of England.
As this series continues, we will delve deeper into the theological content of the WCF, examining its covenant theology, its predestinarian framework, and its minimalist sacramentalism by going to the theologians and their works. By doing so, we aim to reaffirm the integrity of Anglican theology and demonstrate why the WCF, despite its historical significance, cannot serve as a guide or ally for Anglican faith and practice. This series will not only critique the Confession’s theological errors but also highlight the enduring richness of the Anglican tradition, rooted in the faith of the undivided Church and the teachings of the apostles.
July 6 1643, they were given a set of guidelines by Parliament and instructed to review the first ten of the Thirty-Nine Articles, the established doctrinal standard of the Church of England, and "to defend and clarify the Doctrine of them from any false interpretations." Following a day of fasting, the Assembly took an oath, as required by Parliament, to "maintain only what I believe to be the truth in matters of doctrine according to my conscience." Crowley, Weldon S. (Winter 1973). "Erastianism in the Westminster Assembly". Journal of Church and State. 15: 49–64; de Witt, John Richard (1969). Jus Divinum: The Westminster Assembly and the Divine Right of Church Government (Th.D. thesis). Kampen, the Netherlands: J. H. Kok. pp. 32–33.
The Solemn League and Covenant and the Westminster Assembly Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland Committee for the Instruction of the Young; quote: “The leaders of the Parliamentary forces came to the realization that to succeed against the king’s army they would need help. So they looked to Scotland. The Scots agreed to help on condition that Parliament in England would subscribe to a religious covenant – the Solemn League and Covenant. The Covenant was signed by the English Parliament and in the Westminster Assembly, and later in Ireland. It is doubtful if it was viewed in England in the same way it was viewed in Scotland.”
The Minutes and Papers of the Westminster Assembly, 1643–1652. Vol. 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Letham, Robert (2009). The Westminster Assembly: Reading Its Theology in Historical Context. The Westminster Assembly and the Reformed Faith. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing. p. 32
WCF 7. 2
WCF 7. 3
(Summer 2001). "Unity and Disunity at the Westminster Assembly (1643–1649): A Commemorative Essay". Journal of Presbyterian History. 79 (2): 111
Letter (2 February 1635), quoted in The Works of the Most Reverend Father in God, William Laud, sometime Lord Archbishop of Canterbury. Volume V. History of His Chancellorship, &c (1853), p. 117
Speech in the Star Chamber at the censure of John Bastwick, Henry Burton and William Prynne (16 June 1637), quoted in The Works of the Most Reverend Father in God, William Laud, sometime Lord Archbishop of Canterbury. Volume VI—Part I. Miscellaneous”
Letter (2 February 1635), quoted in The Works of the Most Reverend Father in God, William Laud, sometime Lord Archbishop of Canterbury. Volume V. History of His Chancellorship, &c (1853), p. 117
Speech in the Star Chamber at the censure of John Bastwick, Henry Burton and William Prynne (16 June 1637), quoted in The Works of the Most Reverend Father in God, William Laud, sometime Lord Archbishop of Canterbury. Volume VI—Part I. Miscellaneous Papers.—Letters (1857), p. 4
The Commemoration of King Charles the Martyr by: Vernon Staley chapter seven of Liturgical Studies (New York: Longmans, Green, 1907)