Meeting the Demand for Clergy in Victorian England :: European History

Meeting the Demand for Clergy in Victorian England    Many new changes came to Victorian England as a result of the age of industrialization. Where there were once small country parishes, manufacturing towns were springing up. One change resulting from industrialization was the shortage of clergy to fill the new parishes in these towns. These new parishes reflect the demographic changes of the English countryside. Rural villages grew into booming towns. Where a single parish was once sufficient, there was now a need for multiple parishes. The Church of England went about meeting these demands for new clergy in two major ways, actively recruiting men to the clergy and restructuring theological facilities and changing the requirements for ordination. These factors show us some of the upheaval and reconstruction that was going on in the Anglican Church in Victorian England. This was a direct result of the need to train a large number of clergy in a relatively short period of time. Industrialization changed the demographic make up of England. In The Victorian Church in York Edward Royle states that "As suburban development turned sparsely populated manors into thriving and populous communities, further parochial sub-division took place" (2). Where small parishes once were sufficient, the larger manufacturing towns demanded more parishes be added to minister to the larger population. In 1832 the "Church of England was in danger and quite unequipped for ministry to an emerging urban industrial society" (Parsons 16). There was a shortage of clergy because of the rapid unanticipated growth. The demand for so many clergy to be ordained quickly led to restructuring clerical requirements. This demand could be shown in mere numbers, for example: "In 1841 there were just over 14,000 clergy in England and in 1891 there were more than 24,000" (Parsons 25). In the 1840s these clergy were primarily trained at the two major universities, Oxford and Cambridge. A small percentage (14%) came from small theological colleges. Many people could not afford to send their sons to these universities for the length of time required to become ordained. The combination of the increased demand in number of clergy needed and the time restriction for development created a crisis. The result of this crisis, was the development of the lesser theological colleges for the non-ordained and vocationally trained clergy.. This caused a number of issues to be raised. The result of this trend was " the growth of non-university clergy and the inadequacy of its theological instruction" (qtd.