Synod Hears Warnings On Church Union

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30886, 20 October 1965, Page 22

Synod Hears Warnings On Church Union

Warnings were given by two speakers in a debate on church union at the Christchurch diocesan synod last night. One said that a motion before the synod that it rejoiced to hear of the progress made towards church union should not be passed as a polite gesture unless the Church really meant it. The other said that the Church should have a better idea of what church union is when it talked about the progress towards it.

The Dean of Christchurch (the Very Rev. W. A. Pyatt) said that every step taken committed the Church deeper. It must not lead other churches on if it did not really mean what it said. “We Anglicans at general synod last year accepted the invitation of other churches to consider union. If we go forward now this union could come about quite quickly/’ he said. “We know there will be legal, property, and doctrinal difficulties. If we now think these difficulties too great to surmount, or if we don’t want to surmount them, let us say so now. We don’t want the other churches to think we are willing to go forward if we are not." Dean Pyatt said it seemed to him, from the discussions on church union in which he had taken part during the last year, that theologically the Church was being pushed towards it. “When we started talking theology we found, with few

exceptions, that we were talking the same language,” he said. “Same Pressure” Pastorally and administratively the same pressure was applied. “The parents in few homes are of the same denomination. It is unlikely that your children and mine will marry fellow Anglicans. We cannot carry out our mission at home and abroad if we proclaim a denominational church. “It will be considerations such as these that will move general synod and this synod to go further forward. All has been exploratory until now, and those involved are satisfied there is no essential barrier to church union,” Dean Pyatt said. The setting up of a diocesan church union committee and the appointment of its members were sought in Dean Pyatt’s motion before the synod. The motion sought that a committee be appointed at each session of the synod for the purpose of receiving information on church union and conveying this to parishes and to diocesan agencies, encouraging discussions oh the subject at all levels, and making whatever submissions it thought necessary to the Provincial Commission on Church Union.

The Rev. J. O. Rymer said church union was something God would give in His own time. “I believe the Church is making a wrong move in trying to put union on a denominational basis,” Canon Rymer said. “It must come from within. We must have an intellectual, moral, social, and spiritual approach, with emphasis on the views of the minorities. “I would take more notice of the dissentient views, be-

cause they are terribly significant,” he said. Referring to the first report to the negotiating churches on the joint commission on church union before the synod, the Ven. Archdeacon W. M. Davies said the report sought to find out how far the churches were of a common mind. It provided pointers towards a fuller basis for union. Archdeacon Davies said the report was prepared to be studied, discussed and criticised in detail and was submitted to the synod for that purpose. The debate will continue today.