I hear a lot about the 39 Articles and the Prayer Book at the typical Anglican parish, whether high/low Evangelical/Catholic, but nothing about the Homilies. I'm curious, how often were they used in parishes? And did the Caroline Divines or other classical high churchmen quote from them or write about them?
They are not used as frequently as they once were. Their style makes it a bit difficult to regularly incorporate them. However, I've heard portions of them read before in church. Trinity (the seminary) has produced audio versions of them, I believe. As to the Carolines, they probably did, since the Homilies are an authorized formulary, but I'm not aware of a specific incident. I wrote an article on this here: http://www.seckersociety.com/homilies.htm
Great article. I'm curious as to when they fell into "disuse" and how Charles I and Laud, Andrewes, etc. reflected on them, if at all.
Composition of the sermons for the First Book started during the reign of Henry VIII but weren't published until Edward VI came to the throne in 1547. (Convocation of 1542 failed to approve them). The first set were reprinted several times and I believe that for a time during Edward's reign, they were the only sermons permitted in the CofE. They weren't always well received because of their length and were subsequently chopped into instalments for easier digestion. During Mary Tudor's reign the Homilies were ordered to be destroyed although many copies survived. (+Bonner replaced them with his own 'catholicised' set of homilies). When Elizabeth I came to the throne there was need for a settlement of religious conflict and the cessation of contentious preaching by papists and extreme protestants. Elizabeth regulated who could preach and only licensed preachers (usually University educated clergy who subscribed to the Queen's Supremacy, BCP and 39 Articles) were given free reign. The First Set of Homilies were duly reprinted a number of times in the early years of Elizabeth's reign. At this time there was also a shortage of clergy so Lay Readers made their first appearance and were able to lead certain services and read from the Homilies.The Second Set came out in 1563. I expect that the Homilies had the greatest use/impact during Elizabeth's reign as there were close to thirty editions then published. It would be interesting to find out if the Caroline Divines quoted from them, however, they were themselves often excellent preachers. There's an interesting article concerning the Homilies on the Church Society website: (an Evangelical/Low Church organisation). http://www.churchsociety.org/churchman/documents/Cman_089_1_Hughes.pdf