There was a time when the Catholic party of the Church of England was not consumed by the latest ecclesiastical millinery. Its driving force then was a passion for social righteousness. It was also fun in the hands of perhaps the most flamboyant of Christian Socialists, Stuart Headlam. Headlam is still sometimes remembered for standing bail for Oscar Wilde. But there is much more to him than this characteristic act of bravery.
Headlam was born into a Liverpool stockbroking family. It was at Eton where his father, an evangelical, noticed what was to him his son’s worrying liking for High Church ritual. But it was in the marrying of F. D. Maurice’s theology to beautiful ceremonial that Headlam made his unique contribution to public life. A tradition was formed which for 75 years lifted hearts and minds, beautified the worshipping life of countless ordinary people, taught them a Catholic interpretation of the world and gave a political creed based simply on the social teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.
Headlam did not achieve this extraordinary feat without willingly stepping on the corns of many of his elders.
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