THE CRISIS IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 86, 10 January 1928, Page 10

THE CRISIS IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND

Sir, —Very one-sided and superficial is the description of the crisis in the Church of England given by "A Presbyterian Minister” in The Dominion of January 5. "A Presbyterian Minister’’ has much to say about the two extreme fringes of the Church of England— Protestant and Catholic; but he seems to know nothing about the Church of England as it really is. This real Church of England is both Proleslant and . Catholic. It is Protestant in what it denies, and Catholic in what it affirms. As a matter of fact, the word "Protestant” does not appear in the Prayer 800k —and the Prayer Book is the standard of doctrine and worship for all churchmen. .No layman is required to accept the Thirtynine Articles, and the clergy are merely required to give a brond and general assent to them. The Prayer Book requires all of us to express belief in "the Holy Catholic Church” and "the Ono Holy Catholic and Anostolic Church”; it requires us to pray for the "good estate of the Catholic Church”; it requires us to believe "tho Catholic faith.” The. Prayer Book gives great prominence to tho sacramental aspects of religion. The idea that tho Church of England is sharply divided into two sections—Catholic and —is quite wrong. There is'. no clear line of cleavage. The Catholic, Evangelical, and Modernist parties overlap and intermingle. There nre Evangelical Catholics. Modernist Evangelicals, and Catholic Modernists. There is a. steadily growing movement in the direction of unity. ‘l'lio new Prayer Book is an example of this. It has the support of the majority of Evangelicals. Modernists. and Catholics, and of that great central body of churchmen who decline to be labelled. The opponents of the new Prayer Book consist of tho extreme Protestant and tho extreme Catholic sections. No previous Prayer Book has received such wide endorsement both from clergy and laity. The new -Prayer Book has been accepted by Convocation by the Diocesan Conferences, and by the Church Assembly. The Church of England has approved of it. Its rejection in tho House of Commons duo to the operation of English Nonconformists and Scottish Presbyterians. The Archbishop of Canterbury has (he satisfaction of knowing that he has the support, sympathy and confidence of the Church of England. Tho new Prayer Bonk may not satisfy "A Presbyterian Minister”—it would be unreasonable to expect it to do that- — but the great majority of churchmen— Catholic. 'Modernist, and Evangelical—believe that (to quote the "Times”) the new Book gives expression to a nobler conccntion of God. and matches the experience of religious mon to-day more closely than the Book'of U 62; flint if offers a richer store of the ancient pravers of the Church in tho East as well as in the West; and that those enrichments are not in conflict- with the doctrine of the Church of England —I am, etc.,

NORMAN BURTON, Auckland. January fi.