The standard prayer was: "Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth
as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive
us our offenses as we forgive those who have offended against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For
Thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever and ever,
amen."
There was difficulty persuading educated and moral men to be
church ministers, even though Elizabeth expressed to the bishops
her preference for ministers who were honest and wise instead of
learned in religious matters. The Bible was read at home and
familiar to everyone. This led to the growth of the Puritan
movement. The Puritans believed in the right of the individual
Christian to interpret the Scriptures for himself by spiritual
illumination. They opposed the mystical interpretation of the
Communion service. The Puritans complained that the church exerted
insufficient control over the morals of the congregation. Their
ideas of morality were very strict and even plays were thought to
be immoral. The Independent Puritans were those Protestants who
had fled from Mary's Catholic reign to the continent, where they
were persuaded to the ideas of John Calvin of Geneva. He stressed
the old idea of predestination in the salvation of souls, which
had in the past been accepted by nearly all English Christian
leaders, thinkers, and teachers, but not stressed.
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