Good Pastors or Careless Shepherds? Parish Ministers and the English Reformation

The post‐Reformation English parish clergy were not pastoral failures or ‘careless shepherds’ who were forced by parishioners to change their doctrine and tactics. From the beginning, the reformed church taught an ideal of ministry that was extremely sensitive to its audience. This ideal emphasized preaching a balance of repentance and mercy and rejected divisive behaviour such as attacking individual sinners from the pulpit. Moreover, preaching was not the only activity required of godly ministers. They were also expected to be ‘good pastors’ and act as peacemakers and sources of hospitality. Divisive and unpopular ministers existed, but they can be explained by incompetence and failure to follow the norms set out by the church. This article argues that the changes in the quality of parish ministry which took place during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries were affected more by the church's attempt to spread the word about its own expectations than pressure from the laity.