RE-UNION OF CHURCHES

Taranaki Daily News, 5 December 1930, Page 2

RE-UNION OF CHURCHES

GOOD WORK AT LAMBETH I archbishop very hopeful. the SOUTH INDIAN SCHEME. Having attended his second Lambeth Conference Archbishop Averill is con vinced that real progress t?"*™ Christian re-union has been made in tne past ten years and that the prospects of a further advance are very bngnt* “Before this conference many of u& thought that the famous ‘Appeal to All Christian People,’ issued by the conference of 1920, had fallen rather flat,said Archbishop' Averill at Auckland on Tuesday. "It was only when we met this year that we realised how much good ‘it had done.” It was recognised;' of course, that whatever hope’s might have been raised by the Malines conversations, nothing was to be expected at present from the Roman Catholic Church. So far as the orthodox Eastern Church was concerned, the outlook, was very good indeed* Whereas it had sent only two representatives to the 1920 conference, this year there had been a large delegation, headed bv the Patriarch of Alexandria. It was evident that the delegates were most anxious to establish, if full communion with Canterbury. Within the next few years a commission would bo set up to consider all the principal outstanding questions of doctrine and practice, in the hope of reaching a complete understanding.

NON-EPISCOPAL CHURCHES. Delegations from the now Church of Scotland and the Federal Council of the United Free Churches of England had waited on the conference. It was quite clear that the coiifercne held at Lambeth since 1920 had accomnlished a great deal, but much more reSiained to be done. The ih Scotland, as they admitted, had been preoccupied with their o%yn problems of reunion, but the fact that they had Settled their differences was encouraging. SO far. as the English free churches were concerned, the reports of the- discussions showed that the-Anglican emnmunion had gone a long way to meet them, and it now behoved them to make ilia noxf move. Conversations with re presentativeS of the Old Catholic in Holland and elsewhere had been most satisfactory anti would probably be continued. The Scandinavian churches wtte already in virtually complete communion with Canterbury. , It was in South India that the most hopeful movement toward A J utlion had taken place, said the . arca bishop. Whatever occurred theio in the coming years he felt sure that no one could find anything to attack thj liberal treatment which the Lambdth Conference had accorded the m inent.

WIOBLEM OF EPISCOPACY. i The lotion was that a number of native missionary churches, those under the cohtiol o o bishops, desired organic /union. A veiy carefully thought-out phuy had bgi drawn up, providing that foi the next 30 years all fteW ministers of the di ff ftt eht churches should receive diuatiofi Without subscribing t« An Y trinal theory regarding it. . A l baptise members Were to be received as cbm municaiits in full equality, but existing ministers were not ’ necessarily. to_ be deemed upoil an equal foot)ng mle a to the administration of the Holy Com munion. For example a ™ Methodist orders not of ah ririit to officiate at the altar of. an Anglican ,‘ChUtCli, although he might the reunion scheme had been most ably to the conference by the Bishop of Jkd ™X“ d tl ? o co r * - “What impressed me most was the dial way in which it was supported by bislidpS who might be regarded as aj most extreme,” said Archbishop Ai end. “The conferefice gave the scheme, the Warmest approval as an experiment. It d“» JklSel U etrtlroly l™' .The conference , recognised thirt the foshon of Madras aiid his colleagues “rt Vklng rtol ta.en 'W ffie « p»fli«ul»rly the right to tttl P»rt M future Lambeth Conferences.

“MAY SPREAD LIKE WILDFIRE/’ ‘‘Personally, I am very' hopeful W the plan in South Ifidia will come to donibletion before, the 30 years are up; AveYill. “If it isi a . success the movement for reunion orthose lines hlay spread like, wildfire, al the world. The conference. received a renort uuok a scheme for re-umon in Persia upon very similar lines. It se to me that this method of approaching the problem, is entirely in the spirit of the New Testament.” -^ a AVhat was even more encouraging was the posSibiliW- stated in the letter of the conference, that beyond, BUt including, the Anglican communion, there mfoht up a “larger federation of more diverse churches, for which, the SsSHe Lambeth Conferences would be AsSStii6r tlie present disseiitfonS in the Church of England were likely to be a hindfaiice to re - unio . n J/ th ® ar xi fosliop sMd that in the atmosphere of thb conference such questions as the new PraVet Book, the activities of the Sa extreme Anglo-Catlidlies and disZ XSurAalsdpli™ in England Kltea as of merely local imjorlanee. Mort of the ekurelms in Canterbury were no longer bound to tne Book of Common Prayer, and questions of discipline in England did not concert them.