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Department of History

Kristi Flake

My research focuses on the reception and use of the Book of Homilies, the collection of official sermons published in the sixteenth century as part of the official programme of religious reform in England. Throughout the early modern period, the Book of Homilies provided homiletical, doctrinal, ecclesiological, and devotional guidance for the Crown, the clergy, and the people of England. Theologians and literary scholars consider it one of the most important religious texts of the period. Historians, however, have largely neglected the Homilies. My research analyses how the Book of Homilies shaped the Church of England, English Protestant Culture, and the Protestant English state in the seventeenth century. I examine how the Crown, clergy, and laity received, interpreted, and negotiated this text as they continually defined and re-defined what it meant to be an English Protestant during this turbulent and formative period for the Church and the nation. This research is generously funded by the Wolfson Foundation and supervised by Peter Marshall, Mark Knights, and Beat Kümin.

Research Interests

  • Early modern homiletics
  • Political theology in the 17th century
  • The development of Anglican theology and identity in the 17th century
  • The early modern parish
  • Early modern book production & the 17th century printing trade

    Conference Presentations

    • 'The Performance of the Book of Homilies in the English Parish, 1547–1720', Twenty-First Warwick Symposium on Parish Research, University of Warwick (May 2023)
    • ‘The Book of Homilies in Early Modern England: A New Analysis of a Marginalized Text’, Ecclesiastical History Society Conference (June 2023)
    • 'An Ambiguous Authority: The Book of Homilies and the Development of the Church of England, 1688–1720', Newberry Library Multidisciplinary Graduate Conference (February 2024 )
    • 'Romans 13 & the Homiletical Language of Obedience in the Reign of James II', GEMMS Gateway to Early Modern Manuscript Sermons (GEMMS) Conference (October 2024)

    Publications

    Reports

    Teaching Experience

    • Seminar Tutor, Europe in the Making 1450-1800, University of Warwick, 2023-24
    • Graduate Teaching Assistant, Women in Church History, Fuller Theological Seminary, 2018-2019

    Academic Background

    • MA in Theology, Fuller Theological Seminary
    • BA in History, Summa cum laude, Texas Tech University

    Public Engagement

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    kristi dot flake at warwick dot ac dot uk