The Near Loss of Angels

I don't know how to put the video in here, but here's a link!

This video is a Warwick iCast from 2007 about "how angels were nearly purged from our culture and why they survived." It is a short documentary/interview of Professor Peter Marshall of the University of Warwick. Marshall is also a co-editor/author of a book on the subject "Angels in the Early Modern World." This book is a collection of essays on angels, their purposes, and their appearances in Renaissance culture from contemporary authors.

During the late Medieval period, many problems arose because of human dependence on angels. Among these were Angel cults, in which worshipers turned their affections and adoration to angels instead of God, who is the one true divine power. Some of these cults even had leaders who gained power, prestige, and riches by claiming to be angels in corporeal form. Also, there were the Cathar sects who believed that the world had been created by evil angels and that important spiritual figures such as the Virgin Mary and John the Baptist were angels, never existing in flesh (Marshall and Walsham, Migrations of angels in the early modern world, p. 1-22).

The original purpose and existence of angels was corrupted in idolatry and also abused by society as a means of reinforcing the social hierarchy (by example of the celestial hierarchy). To reconstruct the church after these events, the Church tried to completely expel angels from the religion. Marshall describes these actions in his interview as the "sixteenth century protestant reformers attack on the angel." Not only were all angel figures removed from the church, but also holy water, crucifixes, and candles were removed in fear that they too would become the idols of false worship.

People were able to live without these intermediaries, but in order to maintain the feeling of spiritual protection, they needed angels. In the absence of all else, Renaissance England took comfort in knowing that "there were armies of invisible angels which God had sent to protect them," (Marshall). The world was full of evil and evil angels, but God's army of good angels were there to protect the people, despite the Church's attempt to rid the religion. Especially saving was the fact that angels appear throughout the Bible, and the denial of their existence is impossible without completely changing scripture.

I wonder how pure the reformists wanted the religion to become. Should the church be nothing more than an empty building with empty walls in which to worship? God cannot be represented because we cannot comprehend him. He is solely a being and cannot be put into a statue's form or a painting. Therefore one either has to sit and worship in a blank room free of distractions or else look to images which inspire the feeling of God's love such as angels and crosses. Is showing images and symbols of God blasphemous because it makes us think of his messengers instead of Him? I think that a purist religion would be less emotional and too stoic for my own personal spirituality. I need the music and paintings, the images of angels and the illustrated children's Bible. With these tools, religion comes alive and excites the soul, and there is nothing more exciting than nearly crying over a passionate sermon and feeling euphoric singing contemporary praise songs at a youth fellowship meeting.

Also from a contemporary perspective, Marshall poses a question for us today. When asked if he believes that angels are more important in contemporary society, he states that he believes they are, but moreso in a non-Christian way, kind of New Agey with crystals and calling upon your guardian angel, popular culture with Hollywood movies. Does this prove the Protestants’ fear has been made real? Have we fallen back to how the medieval English worshiped angels instead of God? With all of the science believed in today, have we pushed angels into the world of fiction, with TV shows such as Touched by an Angel and Charmed what comes to mind when we think of that image?