ANGLICAN SERVICES

Greymouth Evening Star, 9 October 1928, Page 7

ANGLICAN SERVICES

BISHOP BARNES’S ATTITUDE.

(Australian Press Association.) (By Cable—Press Assn.—Copyright.; -

LONDON, October 8.

“Bishops must not be law-breakers,” declared Bishop Barnes (Bishop of Birmingham), when interviewed on the question of the’Prayer Book. “I would prefer not to criticise, but the situation now created is so grave that the end is likely to be disastrous. * There still is a hope that the private remonstrances of men of weight will prevail. The Bishops are appointed by the Crown, to maintain sound doctrines and lawful order in the national church. The Bishops must not be law breakers. The Revised Prayer Book was rejected by the House of Commons with general approval in the country. This, firstly, was because the revised Book permits the continuous reservation of the Sacrament, and, secondly, because it sanctions an alternative service at Holy Communion. If the Bishops permit these they will be breaking the law and flouting the authority of Parliament. Moral authority to restrain further lawlessness in .church will then end. It would be the same as the Judge of the High Court permitting theft up to ten pounds and severely censuring theft of larger sums.”

Bishop Barnes also declared that the Synod of the Church could no more empower the Bishops to set aside the old Prayer Book than it could confer a right to repudiate the Commandments.

Bishop Barnes says he will most strongly urge that, in the course of private discussions, his Lambeth colleagues should drop the two contentious proposals, and re-submit the remainder to Parliament. The reply of the nation, he said, to any other course would be the disestablishment of the Church. People did not wish to subsidise Catholic innovations, but it would be preferable to the course suggested, which was an indefensible one.

The majority of his colleagues, added Bishop Barnes, had made a serious mistake in under-estimating the Protestant feeling of the country. It would be a worse mistake to challenge the regard for law and order which was one of the soundest instincts of the British race.

“LOYAL CHURCHMEN.”

LONDON, October 8.

Reverend C. Milnes, secretary of the League of Loyal Churchmen, in a statement on behalf of the League, said: The Bishops by promoting the 1928 Prayer Book were guilty of seditious conspiracy, because they were exciting the King’s subjects to act unlawfully and claiming to be above the law.

He said: “We call on the Premier to put down sedition, and bring the offenders to justice.”