CANTERBURRY CATHEDRAL

Canterbury Cathedral

The city of Canterbury is in Great Britain, Kent, and is the city where the main cathedral of the archbishop of England is located — now residence of archbishop-primus of the Anglican Church.

The Archbishop of Canterbury is from of old the head of the Anglican Church; that is why the Canterbury Cathedral is the main temple of the country. The builders did their best to make it especially beautiful and majestic.

The Canterbury Cathedral’s popularity is related to the famous story of Thomas Becket, Lord Chancellor of King Henry II. On King Henry II’s suggestion, Becket, who had been the king’s friend for many years, became Archbishop of Canterbury and headed up the Anglican Church. The king’s plan was to submit in this way the spiritual authorities to the interests of the secular authorities, but he thought wrong: having become the head of the church, Becket strictly followed the policy of fighting for its interests. The conflict emerged because of the secular authorities’ right to judge the clergy and the clergymen’s right to appeal to the Roman Pope. Henry II was extremely frustrated by this circumstance. Friendship, of course, ended, and the king began to seek ways of doing away with the disagreeable archbishop. They say that Henry even prayed asking God to rid him of Becket. But that did not help; and then on the king’s secret order four English barons killed Becket right in the Canterbury Cathedral: on 29 of September, 1170, the killers burst into the temple and axed the archbishop on the altar’s steps.

The king later repented in what he had done, and three years after his death, Becket was canonized, while King Henry II in public repented on the archbishop’s tomb. Since then, the Canterbury Cathedral, where Becket’s tomb was located until the beginning of XVI century, became a place frequently visited by pilgrims.

Originally, the relics were kept in the cathedral’s script, and in 1220 were moved to the Holy Trinity chapel, which since that time has been called the Becket Chapel. Numerous pilgrims, among whom there were a lot of noble men and royal persons brought great offerings to Becket’s tomb. French King Louis VII, for example, offered a precious stone “as big as a hen’s egg.” By the beginning of XVI century, Becket’s cult lost its popularity and the stream of pilgrims decreased but the annual income of the cathedral, nevertheless, was pretty significant counting in average up to 4,000 pounds. This provoked envy from the poor Royal court, and in 1538 English King Henry VIII decided to lay his hand upon the treasures of the Canterbury Cathedral. He accused the late Thomas Becket of treason and ordered the archbishop who had already been dead for three and a half centuries to… appear before court! Since Becket, according to the court’s definition, “impudently did not wish to come to defend himself,” he was found guilty, and the king lightheartedly ordered to plunder the Becket Chapel. During the English Reformation the Canterbury Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, King Henry VIII’s supporter, supported Act of Supremacy (1534), an English legislative document that finally acknowledged the Church of England’s breaking away from Rome during Henry VIII’s reforms. The statute passed by “the Parliament of Reformation,” on the king’s prompting, proclaimed him “the only Supreme Head” of the Church of England called Ecclesia Anglicana with all the “titles, honors, dignities, privileges and incomes belonging to the dignity of the Supreme Head of the Church.” (SR., 26 Hen. VIII. C. 1). The Act of Supremacy bestowed the king not only with full jurisdiction over the church with the right to control its incomes and appoint clergymen to church offices (which to a certain extent had already been a privilege of medieval monarchs before), but also prerogatives that belong solely to the primus of the church: to determine doctrinal matters, to establish order of the liturgy, to visit dioceses, to inspect the clergy, to correct misleadings and to uproot heresies. Henry VIII, however, did not claim the right to administer sacraments and ordain priests leaving these functions to the Archbishop of Canterbury. The very character of the Parliament’s Statute excluded broad theological ground for the undertaken step. Superiority of the secular Lord over the Church of England was announced as an absolute historical fact that had to be recognized by the English clergy. The Act was annulled during the rule of Catholic Maria Tudor. After Elizabeth I took over the throne, the Parliament restored the Act of Supremacy (1559) with minor changes. Elizabeth I called herself not “the Supreme Head,” but “the Supreme Governor in all the spiritual and church affairs” (SR. 1 Eliz. I. P. 1) believing that a woman cannot be considered the head of the Church. This was also determined by a political need to win support of the subjects who had kept Catholic faith. In 1560, the effect of the Act was also spread over Ireland. The passing of the Act of Supremacy was accompanied by requirement to give a special oath of loyalty to the monarch as the Head of the Church, whereas every priest, official, member of university corporations and each school teacher had to put their signature under it. Charles II required the same oath after restoring monarchy and the Anglican Church after a period of civil wars and Republican rule. At the same time there was no new edition of the Act of Supremacy, and it is still legally valid. (Statutes of the Realm. L; 1819. vol. 3, 4.)

At the time of Kranmer all the monasteries and several church hospitals were closed, four archbishop’s manors were given to the king, the relics of Thomas Becket were destroyed, and the mention of him and the Roman Pope was taken off all the theological texts. Maria Tudor’s coronation led to reconciliation with Rome and appointing Cardinal Reginald Pole Archbishop of Canterbury and Pope’s legate (1556-1558). During Elizabeth I’s rule the Act of Supremacy was restored, and Canterbury became the center of the spiritual life of the Anglican Church and remains to be so to this day.

Playing the role of the country’s main cathedral, the Canterbury Temple was being built and rebuilt for several centuries; numerous offerings and donations by renowned people allowed doing it. Originally, on the Cathedral’s site there used to be a small church built at the time of the Saxon kings of England. The building of the grandiose cathedral in Canterbury began after the Norman invasion. The initiator of the construction was Bishop Lanfranc, William the Conqueror’s confessor, the founder of the Norman Dynasty of English kings. Lanfranc’s successors significantly changed the initial project by enlarging the eastern part of the temple. In 1174, four years after Thomas Becket’s murder, this cathedral burned down. The new building of the Canterbury Cathedral was erected after a fire in 1174 by French architect Guillaume from Sans and significantly differs from French prototypes. The differences can be seen in the layout: the cathedral has two transepts, one shorter than the other. Guillaume from Sans was substituted with William of England, who erected the Holy Trinity Chapel — Becket’s Chapel — in place of the apse of the old cathedral. This chapel with the tomb of the archbishop is located in the eastern part of the cathedral.

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