CHURCH AND STATE

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 83, 4 October 1935, Page 4

CHURCH AND STATE

CONFLICT OVER MARRIAGE?

Dr. D. J. M. Creed, Ely Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, told the Modern Churchmen's Conference at Cambridge recently that the problems of the marriage law,- if not carefully handled, might disturb the constitution In the Church and State, says the "Daily Telegraph." A majority of (he Joint Committee of the House of Convocation, he said, assumed that the remarriage ol a party to a divorce suit during the lilctfme of a partner was an infringement of the Christian code, even though the person might have .been the innocent vieii m of a partner's misconduct. The minority questioned alike the wisdom and the justice of submitting an otherwise innocent person to disabilities in deference to the supposed Christian principle that no marriage in any circumstances should be dissolved. "It is plausible," he sajd, "to argup that the Church should settle, its own concerns with marriage, and that the State should make its marriage law without direct regard to Christian principles or to the Church. But such supposition would be based upon a misapprehension of the situation. . "The generalities of men and women are closely concerned to uphold the permanence of the marriage bond, and I think it may be said that they wish this aim to.govern whatever fresh legislation may be found necessary. "If it be true—and I have little doubt that it is—that in this case the clerical minority has the support" of a majority of the lay members of the Church, that should ensure the ultimate defeat of a proposal to suppress differences and to assert that the view of the clerical majority is not only tolerable, but obligatory. . : . ; "I suppose that there is still some hope that a clash may be averted; It is to be presumed that the bishops will not attempt to act without first referring the matter to the Church Assembly. . "It would greatly strengthen the position of that body if it gav# decisive expression to the opposition which this new policy, if pursued, will certainly provoke, and it would certainly be ail advantage to keep the controversy out of Parliament and the courts if. it can be done." .