Conventicle

At a semantic level, conventicle is a Latinized synonym of the Greek word for church, and references Jesus' promise in Matthew 18:20, "Where two or three are met together in my name.

Later, it became a negative term, implying that those within a conventicle opposed the ruling ecclesiastical authorities; for example, as applied to a plot of mutinous monks in a monastery.

This gathering was the type that might take place for prayer, mutual edification, and memorial observances in private houses such as that of Mary, the mother of John (Acts 12:12).

Within a short time, those gathered were deemed suspicious by Jewish ecclesiastical authorities, who branded the new faith as heretical, and sought to suppress these conventicles, one of their most zealous agents being the future Apostle Paul.

In the 4th and 5th centuries, the term conventicle could apply to the meetings of such Christian nonconformists as the Montanists and the Donatists, which were prohibited by the state under penalty of death.

Both the practice and the word conventicle were carried by the anti-Roman Catholic Lollards (as the most determined supporters of Wyclif were called) to Scotland.

[4] It was not until after the Reformation that 'conventicle' gained a legal connotation: descriptive of the meeting place or assemblage for worship or consultation of those who departed from the Established Church of England.

Queen Elizabeth, in her contest with Puritanism, supported the Act of Uniformity, which demanded that all subjects of the Realm must conform to the tenets of the Church established by law.

The 11th Article of the Book of Canons (drawn up in 1603) censures "the maintainers of conventicles"; the 12th, "the maintainers of constitutions made in conventicles"; and the 73rd says: "Forasmuch as all conventicles and secret meetings of priests and ministers have ever been justly accounted very hateful to the state of the Church wherein they live, we do ordain that no priests or ministers of the Word of God, nor any other persons, shall meet together in any private house or elsewhere to consult upon any matter or course to be taken by them, or upon their motion or direction by any other, which may any way tend to the impeaching or depraving of the doctrine of the Church of England, or the Book of Common Prayer, or any part of the government or discipline now established in the Church of England, under pain of excommunication ipso facto."

In 1664, a statute called 'the Conventicle Act' made illegal any gathering in a private house for religious worship attended by a number exceeding five the regular members of the household, under penalty of fine, imprisonment, or transportation.

The updated law empowered any justice of the peace to convict the ministers on the oath of a single informer, who was to be rewarded with a third of all fines collected.

Bishop Burnet, in his History of his own Time, describes how the Quakers resolutely declined to obey the law, and fearlessly continued their prohibited meetings.

[11] From 1662 to 1678, various Acts were passed by the Privy Council and the Court of High Commission, prohibiting conventicles and imposing severe penalties upon participants.

The result was the creation of field conventicles — meetings held under cover of night, in the open air, on moors or hills, in glens and ravines, or wherever safety and suitability could be combined.

Baptism was administered, and Communion was dispensed, often to mass groups of people, the rite taking days to celebrate and several ministers officiating in turn.

One of these attacks let to the Battle of Drumclog, 11 June 1679, which issued in the only victory gained by the Covenanters (upholders of Presbyterianism), and the only defeat sustained by Claverhouse ('Bonnie Dundee'), the most zealous of their military persecutors.

[13] Conventicles of believers in Reform were held in Scotland in the 1500s and are considered instrumental in the movement that drove the French regent Mary of Guise from power.

From 1660 to the 1688 Revolution, conventicles were usually held by Covenanters opposed to Charles II's forced imposition of Episcopalian government on the established Church of Scotland.

However, in the ensuing rebellion against the Williamite coup, some of James' loyal followers – the original "Jacobites," among whose ranks were many Highlanders – defeated the new Government's forces at Killiecrankie.

The forces supporting the new regime included the renowned Scots Brigade – a unit of Scottish professional soldiers in Dutch service, some of whom had come over to Britain with William.

Former rebels fought to uphold the ascendant Calvinist Protestant order in defense of the Covenant against the defenders of the old Episcopalian and Roman Catholic establishment.

After the Revolution of 1688 and the accession of William of Orange to the British throne, an Act of Toleration was passed, claiming that Covenanters who swore allegiance to the Crown and to the doctrinal sections of the Thirty-nine Articles would be allowed to continue their gatherings without penalty.

[19] During the prolonged attempts of Philip II of Spain in the Netherlands to promote the Roman Catholic Church, the Protestant party headed by Les Gueux ('The Beggars') were forbidden free exercise of their worship.

[18][20] Conventicles were popular in the southern districts of France during the struggle of the Huguenot Camisards (les Enfants de Dieu) against Louis XIV.

A peculiarity of these Camisard gatherings was the large part played by the 'prophets' — men and women, and occasionally children, generally uneducated — who were thought to speak under direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit, after the manner of the prophets in the Church of antiquity.

[18] In the official catholic church, conventicles were inspired by Cardinal Richelieu's vision of a unified France, spurred by the incitements of Madame de Maintenon (herself once a Huguenot), and encouraged by the great preacher Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet.

[18] Due to concern over possibly mixed-gender meetings, sexual impropriety, and subversive sectarianism, conventicles were condemned first by mainstream Lutheranism and then by the Pietists within decades of their inception.

According to Kaufman, modern-day Jewish synagogues resemble churches, whereas smaller meeting places—the shul, hevre, anshe, or shtibl—can be described as conventicle settings.