Anglicans: Preacher for the Empire's Parish

The dean of St. Paul's Cathedral in London—"the parish church of the British Empire"—has traditionally been a preacher of scholarship and fire. Humanist John Colet, who held the post from 1505 to 1519, was the learned friend of Erasmus and More. John Donne, during the reign of James I, uttered sermons from St. Paul's pulpit that will ring in human ears as long as the bell tolls for mankind. From 1911 to 1934, Anglicanism's most prestigious preaching office was occupied by "the Gloomy Dean," William Ralph Inge, who outraged England with his then radical opinions on birth control and pacificism.

Accordingly,...