CREED REVISION IN SCOTLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 2784, 24 July 1907, Page 13

CREED REVISION IN SCOTLAND.

A striking illustration, at once of the direction and of the pace of present-day movement in things theological, is furnished by the demand for creed revision now being made by both the leading sections of Scottish Presbyterianism. One of the principal topics at the General Assembly of the Ohurch or Scotland is the revision of the formula of subscription to the Confession of Faith. What the feeling is on this subject,' both in the Established and the Ignited Free Church, is shown in the volume just published by Outram and Co., of Glasgow, entitled "Creed Revision in Scotland," the contributors to which are described as " Leading Scottish Ministers.' There are 18 contributors, all of whom, with the exception of Dr John Hunter, of Glasgow, are Presbyterian clergy. What firet strikes one in studying these utterances, which appeared first as articles in the Glasgow Herald, is their astonishing unanimity on the subject of the Westminster Confession. Dr Moffat. who writes an introduction, quotes an influential layman as saying the creed had become to him " remilsive and hateful," while he himstlf describes it as containing " irrelevant and antiquated features." The next writer observes that "it lies so outside our ways of thinking that we have no real relation to it at all, not even that of opposition." Professor Menzies says the churches have found out that the Confession " is, as the creed of a living Church in the present day, impossible." "The professed creed of the Church," observes another contributor, " does not any longer, as a system, have any particular relation to its religious life." "The Confession of Fajth," says yet another, " must go." Reading these reiterated and often passionate utterances, one might almost think that the Presbyterian ministry was at last taking its revenge on the instrument that so heavily and for so long has pressed upon its mind and conscience. Whatever be the immediate issue of the present movement, one thing is certain: the old theolojrv has pone, never to return. Scotland, its ancient home and stronerhold. ha 6 itself turned against it. It is Calvinistic in the old sense no longer. This time it is not the outsiders — a Burns, a Hume, a Scott — who repudiate the dogma that consipms by foreordination the mass of mankind to perdition : it is the Churoh itself speaking through its representative ministry. What is happenine. it is r^lo.ir, is not an outbeak of caprice here and there, but a mental and moral evolution a 6 resistless as the tide. Tho Scottish clergy, a body of devout and, at the same time, alert and highly educated minds, renrescnt in their nresent attitude that further oDenir.er of the human intellect arid heart in spiritual things which may well be cal'pd thf> Divine revelation of our time. — The Christian World. RuKirao has enabled many a pror sufferer from rheumatism, gout, nation. and 'uinbagc to orce more onjoy hcaltli atKl happiness. 2/G and 4/6. Sold cveivvdieie.