DISESTABLISHMENT OF CHURCH OF ENGLAND

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6843, 22 February 1929, Page 6

DISESTABLISHMENT OF CHURCH OF ENGLAND

Unlikely Eventuality

HIGH CHURCHMEN MUST FACE FINANCIAL FACTS

MORE SPIRITUAL FREEDOM. Per Press Association. HAMILTON, Last Night. In discussing the Prayer Booh controversy and the possibility of disestablishment, the Rev. Dr. H. D. A Major, a leading Anglican modernist from Oxford, informed an interviewer that although disestablishment was threatened by High Churchmen because they did not get certain concessions, when it actually came to a possibility, their voices bceamo less clamant. Disestablishment would mean an enormous financial loss to tho Church. He belicvod such a drastic step most unlikely. The endowed churches throughout England would lose millions in money.

"Since the war, the English clergy have been carrying on with much smaller stipends than before. It would be disastrous for them to face such an issue. There is a desire on the part of a large section of the clergy at home to see the Anglican church with as much freedom as the Kirk of Scotland. The Presbyterians have secured a largo measure of self-government. Instead of asking for disestablishment, many churchmen are urging more spiritual freedom in the same way as was accorded the Kirk of Scotland.”