CHURCH UNITY

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 56, 3 September 1937, Page 11

CHURCH UNITY

FAITH AND ORDER

THE WORLD CONFERENCE

(From "The Post's" Representative.) | ' LONDON, August 14. Reports of the various sections of the World Conference on Faith and Order were submitted when public meetings were resumed in Edinburgh yesterday.' The Archbishop of York, president of the conference, was in the chair. The report of Section 1, which was submitted, declared that "We recognise that there is in connection with the subject committed to our section' no ground for maintaining division . between the Churches." The Key. William Manson, Church of Scotland, Edinburgh, who presented the report, emphasised the unanimity which'from first to. last had characterised their discussion. The report was laid before them without reduction and without reserve. They recognised no ground for maintaining division between the Churches. Section 1 of the conference undertook the study of the differences and agreements of all the Churches in Christendom concerning the doctrine of grace. Three other sections are engaged in studying the Word of God, the Ministry, and the Sacraments and the problems of federation, true intercommunion, and true corporate union. A "notable advance" was referred to by Archbishop Stephen, of Sofia; Orthodox Church of Bavaria. ' "If all the work of the section^ has been as satisfactory as that; done in Section 1," he asserted, "we may say that the Rubicon has been crossed, and we have already advanced on the way which leads us to our aim." "I wish there had been more recognition of the pressure there is on the souls of men and upon the whole riddle of life," said Bishop Neville Talbot, Vicar of. St. Mary's Church, Nottingham. "We live in a world that 5s in agony over its faith. We live in a world that is wrestling with fundamental pessimism, of widespread agony of soul and mind. I believe that this report, in its great affirmations, would have been still more valuable to men of our generation, and the younger generation, if it had more explicitly referred to the difficulties which legitimately intervene, making great primal affirmations about God." ■■■■■■ . New; Zealand delegates at the conference include Bishop West-Watson, of Christchurch, and Canon P. E. James, ■Vicar-designate of Halifax., .j