ANGLO-CALVINISTS. — This name is sometimes applied to Anglicans in order to indicate the Calvinist tendency of their Church. The Anglo-Catholics in particular protest against this designation, affirming that the Church of England does not accept Calvin’s decree on predestination, nor is it governed according to the Presbyterian system, while conceding that the members of the Low Church, with their Calvinizing doctrines, have given certain authors occasion to apply this name to the Church of England. The defenders of the name, on the other hand, maintain that Anglican history and doctrines provide good reasons for applying or using II.
First of all, there is no doubt that the Calvinists exercised great influence in the time of Edoardo VI (1547–53); moreover, until 1662 the Edwardian formula for the consecration of bishops was retained, in which nothing is found to distinguish them from simple priests—a doctrine fundamental among the Calvinists. Then, the final version of the 39 Articles was drawn up in such a way that some of them can be interpreted in a Calvinist sense (cf. Calvinism, in Dictionary of English Church History), and the 9 Lambeth Articles, approved in 1595 and for many years appended to the 39 Articles, preserve, even in their modified form, a meaning sufficiently favorable to the Calvinist decree. Finally, prelates of Calvinist tendencies and doctrines were without difficulty
elected to the Anglican primatial see of Canterbury, e.g. Abbot (v.) and Tait.
All this contributed to the fact that the Russian “Orthodox” Church itself considers all Anglicans, except those belonging to the High Church, to be Calvinists, as may be inferred from the reply given by the Russian Holy Synod (23 February 1903) to the Ecumenical Patriarch, who had requested its opinion concerning union with the Anglicans.