SOURCE: Bond, Ronald B. “Cranmer and the Controversy Surrounding Publication of Certayne Sermons or Homilies (1547).” Renaissance and Reformation/Renaissance et Reforme 12 (1976): 28-35.

In the following essay, Bond assesses the history and the critical reception of Certain Sermons, or Homilies.

The attempt of the English church during the sixteenth century to vindicate Henry's split with Rome was, of course, a long and gradual process toward viable Anglicanism, a process which included translations of the scriptures and some ancillary texts such as Erasmus' Paraphrases into the vernacular, the formulation of a new service of worship contained in the Book of Common Prayer, the evolution of what came to be the Thirty-Nine Articles and the welding together of sacred and secular power in the person of the monarch, whether he be called Supreme Head or Supreme Governor of the native church. In addition, the church—if we can use that collective...