THE CROSS AND THE CHURCH.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9075, 8 June 1888, Page 3

THE CROSS AND THE CHURCH.

TO THE EDITOR.

S3 Sir, — said last week that I did not intend to seek further publicity through the columns of your newspaper for various Christian and Catholic practices and usages of the Catholic [vide the creeds of the Church] Church of England, but I read in this morning's issue such a startling and interesting piece of information communicated by one "Marcus" that I cannot refrain from replying to him, and at the same time to sundry other correspondents. I very much wish to know from where or from whom did he derive that startling piece of intelligence— the sign of the redemption of mankind, its presence and use on this finite earth, are the work and cunning of the devil ? He certainly did not get his information from the Bible, for S. Paul says : <! God forbid that I should glory save in the Cross of Christand again in Phil. iii. he bids us beware of the " enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, "&c. Nor did " Marcus" obtain his information from the Prayer-book, as canon 30 says, "The honour and dignity of the name of the cross begat a reverent estimation, even in the Apostles' times, of the sign of the cross, which the Christians shortly afterwards used in all their actions." Tertullian (2nd century) and S. Cyril (4th century) both write on the use of the cross ; S. Cyril says, " But even though another person conceal it, do thou openly sign it on thy brow, that the devils, on beholding that royal symbol, may flee away trembling." The sign of the cross is made by order of the Prayer-book at baptism. The " Parson," in an excellent tract on worship, says, "Often and often when pressed sore by temptations, from which there seemed no l escape, the making of that holy sign has driven away the evil suggestions like darkness before a sunbeam; especially in temptations to sins of the flesh,—there it seems as if the use of the hands in a direct act of worship renders it almost impossible that they snould be employed in ministering to evil." Let " Marcus" and others try this in all reverence, "Taste and see that the Lord is gracious and before rushing into print let them read their Bibles more thoughtfully and carefully, and those who are English Churchmen, be sure that their protests are in accord, with the Prayer-book, whose teaching they profess to follow. They say nothing at all about the non-observance of certain canons and rubrics, such as the canon that commands that a "reverence and obeisance be done both at the coming in and going out of the said churches, chancels and chapels," and again in canon 18, "and likewise when in time of Divine service the Lord Jesus shall be mentioned, due and lowly reverence shall be done by all present, as it hath been accustomed " (this, evidently founded on the apostle's command, "at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow"); they entirely ignore the breaking of the ornaments rubric, of the rubric that provides for daily morning prayer in all churches ; the feasts and fasts commanded to be observed by our Church ; the plainly inferred then custom of frequent celebrations during the week (for the Prayer-books says: note also that the collect, epistle, and gospel appointed for the Sunday, shall serve all the week after); these and other commands and orders of the Prayer-book are completely passed over by the generality of the so-called Low Church people. As for that bugbear " Popery," all I have to say is this, that a true member of the Anglican Church will never embrace the false doctrines of Rome, and nowhere more than in High Church pulpits are the errors of Rome protested against. If the Church here exhibited a little more life, and shook off her lukewarmness (Rev. iii., 16) and embraced in reality full Catholic and Scriptural doctrines and observances, as she has so successfully done at home, God helping, we should hear less of the devil instituting the sign of the Cross ; we should see free and open churches, a greater and higher spiritual life, and therefore more commercial morality and honesty.—l am, etc., Churchman.