FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANITY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20288, 22 December 1927, Page 15

FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANITY.

BISHOP BARNES AND HIS CRITICS.

The pulpit sensation created recently by the Rt. Rev. Dr Barnes, Bishop of Birmingham, ns the result of his remarks on the subject of evolution, invests the following article from the Spectator (London), of October, 1922, with appropriate point and interest. Last Sunday in St. Paul’s Cathedral there was an incident which must bo described as painful, whether one regards it from the point of view of the sincere Canon Bullock-TVcbster who felt it to be bis duty to make a public protest against the Bishop of Birmingham being allowed to preach, or from the point of view of the worshippers for whom the service was startlingly interrupted, or from the point of view of the Bishop of Birmingham, who was denounced at the moment when ho was about to preach and needed all the authority of his office to instruct his congregation in a difficult matter. As it happened, the sermon proved to be a noble series of thoughts on the reactions between science and religion. For our part we think that whatever doctrinal offences may be alleged against a preacher, and however deep may be the convictions of his opponents, there can bo no excuse whatever for the sudden interruption of a service in church. Such an interruption can never be saved from an appearance of theatricality. There are always other moans of protesting. Imagine the feelings of those who intended immediately after the sermon to approach the altar and engage in the most solemn service of the church. If they were doing what they have always been enjoined to do, they were at the moment of interruption trying to bring themselves into that frame of mind which alone, according to the Prayer Book, justifies anyone in taking part in the Holy Communion. After the interruption, though it was no doubt conducted in as orderly a manner as an interruption can be, it must have been impossible for them to recover their composure or their concentration. The whole thin: was shattering. To this extent Canon Bullock-Webster undoubtedly defeated his intentions, the point of his denunciation, rather ironically, being that the Bishop of Birmingham, by his heretical teaching, had poured contempt upon the sacraments of the church.

It would be interesting to know how many people who have been discussing this strange affair have remembered certain words in the first Exhortation in the Communion Service—an exhortation which is seldom road in public. The “ way and moans ” are there described for becoming “worthy partakers” of (ho Communion' Service.' The intending communicant is required not only to search his heart to discover his offences against God, but to discover those against his neighbours. Ho is exhorted to' reconcile himself with his neighbours, whether he haa to make restitution or to forgive an offence ; and ho is informed that if he has not thus prepared himself he is “ doing nothing else but increase his damnation. In otheV words, the church insists that Christian charity is equally with a humble and repentant attitude to God the necessary perparation for the Commnion Service. _ It will be said that the Bishop of Birmingham’s offence in the eyes of Canon Bullock Webster left no room for charity. But if that were true, the Church of England could not really be a comprehensive church. It would bo a church of an exclusive group. Undoubtedly there _ arc many earnest people who would like the church to exact strict qualifications. They think (perhaps piously forgetting the parable of the wheat and the tares) that the church can maintain exclusive standards, and that it cannot lie wholehearted and really definite without them. The constitution of the Church of j.ngland is, nevertheless, a flat repudiation of sucli ideas. It is a national church with wide oi>cn doors. It repels nobody who would come to the scat of mercy. If this were not the constitution and the theory, it would he impossible for most of us to support the establishment as we now sincerely do.

In a comprehensive church there is room for all’who “profess and call themselves Christians.” Surely there is not bo much Christianity in the world that we can afford to thrust out of the fellowship anyone whose beliefs are sincere, although thev may not precisely he our own. That learned 'theologian, Gwatkin, in his lectures at Cambridge, used to insist upon the alertness which the divisions of religious belief preserved in the Church. iVse divisions, lie would say, were often deplored, but thev had a virtue, too; they were better than what might prove to bo the dignified slumber of complete agreement. Some of the heretics in the early history of the Church were notoriously men with the highest aims and of the greatest spirituality. Such men fell into heresy through over-emphasis ; they were so intent upon emphasising a truth which they feared was in danger of neglect that they went too far in the attempt to correct the balance. Even if Ariua himself was not in character all that he might have been, there can be little doubt that his purpose of proving the unity of the Godhead was sound and loyal. But he went too far. To gain one point he sacrificed others. The victors of the Council of Nicaea, after all, had no other intention than that which Arius avowed—to define the unity of the Godhead. We cannot get on without definitions ; and definitions are dogma. Canon Scott Holland used to say, when he heard untidy thinkers talking about dropping dogma and getting back to the Christianity of Christ, that you might as well drop astronomy in order to got back to the stars. The point is that the Bishop of Birmingham lias his definitions, and Canon Bullock-Webster has his definitions; and that for each of them his definitions make possible spiritual perception and satisfaction. We are by no means defending all that the Bishop of Birmingham has said. Wo think that by throwing about such injurious phrases as “ superstition,” “ magic,” and ‘‘ idol atry,” when be repudiates the AngloCatholic convention of the Eucharist, ho is tactless. He could express his beliefs quite as plainly without being so hurtful. All the same, one who is both a learned man of science and a theologian has a great part before him in these days. Look at the matter through the icyes of some layman who feels—unnecessarily, perhaps, biit still poignantly—that the ground of his religion has been falling from under his fret. All the dogmas, all the precepts, and all the authority of the church, ns bo has understood those things, fail to help him. He wants a re-statement of his religion, if it is to satisfy him, in tern's of scientific knowledge. What a light breaks upon such a man when he can turn to the man of science who is Bishop of Birmingham !

Let ns give the Bishop of Birmingham credit for feeling from the bottom of In's soul that, (W church is at a parting of the ways. IL‘ sees one wav which is to make material objects a mystical means of grace, and another way which is to develop the illimitable possibilities of spirituality within a man, for which pnr|ii.| materia! ohjeelo may indeed be in valuable symbols but cannot themselves mechanically contribute to a growth of spirituality. There is a place for those who think with the Bi-hop of Birmingham. They have nothing to apologise for when they make belief possible to those for whom it was formerly impossible. What we hope is that tlie types of thought which arc represented by such clashing spirits as the Iti-hop of Birmingham and ('anon BullockWebster will he able, after warning of tins disagreeable incident, to live in charily, helping such as they nan in their own special wavs. .Jeremy I aylor long ago perceived the only rule for peace bet wren ■•■an,-| dotal; •! and non -ac,. rdotalisls when he said: “Dispute rot concerning the secret of the mv-.fery ami the timely of the manner of Christ's presence. Sufficient for thee that Christ, .shall be present to thy soul.”