LATITUDINARI (BROAD CHURCH). — A name already used in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and applied to those who “looked toward Lambeth and rowed toward Calvin,” or to those who “let fanatics argue about the Creed and contented themselves with living well” (as Christians).
Latitudinarianism spread in England partly because of the scant Anglicanism of the House of Hanover and partly because of the apathy of the Anglican clergy, but without forming a distinct class or Church, since the l. were indistinguishable Low Church (v.), at times adding the qualification “liberals.” The Oxford Movement, with its appeal to primitive traditions, the study of the Holy Fathers, etc., prompted some l. to write Essays and reviews in 1860, in which the Athanasian Creed and the fundamental doctrines of Christianity were attacked. The government, through the appointment of l. bishops and dignitaries, seemed inclined to favor it; the name Broad Church (“Broad Church”) then began to prevail. Although in words they claim to belong to the Anglican Church, as the official Church of the State, in reality their doctrines increasingly incline toward modernism and rationalism; there are nevertheless some who accept doctrines of the High Church and the Low Church.