A PROTEST.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2473, 7 March 1893, Page 2

A PROTEST.

TO THE EDITOR, Sir, —In your leader of Saturday last you state “ the Archbishop of Canterbury recommends the reading of special collects for three Sundays in succession against Home Rule,” and then proceed to argue that “ The Church of England is on the high road to destruction in offering up petitions to God to interfere in politics.” How very dreadful! It is a pity you did not carefully read the cablegram about the Archbishop’s recommendation. Had you done so you might have saved yourself the trouble of writing a most ungenerous article, and spared many of your readers a good deal of irritation. I do not think you would be guilty of wilful misrepresentation, but I am at a loss to understand how you could have so mis-read the cablegram. Pray, Sir, what part of the cablegram tells you that the Archbishop wants his people to pray against Home Rule, or to ask God to “ interfere in politics ? ” Please put on your spectacles, and read tlffe cablegram again. Can you not see that the Archbishop distinctly refuses to do what you charge him with doing ? He “ refuses ” to sanction special prayers on the subject of Home Rule, but recommends that in these days of political strife his people should use the collect for the sth, 16th, or 22nd Sunday after Trinity. Now, sir, I dare say you have somewhere in your sanctum sanctorum a copy of the Euglish Book of Common Prayer. Will you kindly read the prayers or “ collects ” referred to. You will observe that they are just ordinary prayers used on certain Sundays of the Christian year, and they are petitions that Church-people may live quiet, orderly lives, and that the Church may be devoutly given to good works. In fact, the Archbishop recommends that instead of “ asking God to interfere in politics,” the Church should pray for peace, order, and good-will among men. Have you any objection to such prayers 1 Might not the most pronounced Home Ruler use these “collects” with profit at this lime? Your virtuous indignation atthe Church’s “ interference j.n politics ” is very edifying. Pity you could not instil your ideas upon this subject in the minds of the priests in Ireland. Do, please, send a copy of you article to the R C, Bishop of Meath and his priestly satelites, who have been so prominently interfering in polities of late. You seem to me to have gone out of your way to attack the English Church. Do you forget that Mr Gladstone and most of his cabinet are members of the English Cfinroh, that multitudes of English Ghurchmou Utq iu favour of Home Rule for Ireland, anq that large numbers of your readers are members of the church that you have needlessly attacked ! Was there any necessity to bring up the old subjectof Dis-establishraent in Ireland ? What need to tell the old story of the Rev. Mr Maxwell and his borrowed congregation ? Perhaps the reverend gentleman could tell a diltorent story to-day. In your reference to the dis-establishmeut of the Church in Wales, yoq say “ The Welsh people are nearly aijL W,esley;ms.” No, sir, they are not. 1 The W©§tey a, ?S scarcely number more iii si than one-. 1 of Ws}?]} population. The great. Nonconformists are Calvmistxc . ists —Presbyterian body having no connection with the Wesleyaus. There are several other mis-statements iti your leader, but I shall be satisfied if you find me space for this sufficiently length}" protest.—l am, &c., Churchman. Temuka, March 6th. [This is the cablegram referred to “ The Archbishop of Canterbury recommends the reading of a special collect for the sth, Kith, or 22nd Sunday after Trinity, in view of Home Rule, but refuses a special prayer/’ Collect means a prayer, therefore we took the cablegram to mean that prayers were to be offered up against Homo Rule. Our correspondent says it does not mean anything of the kind, and we shall leave it at that. All we said concerning the Church is contained in the following paragraph :

" It seems to us, however, that the Established Church is going on the high road to her own destruction in offering up

petitions to God to interfere in politics The prayers of the Church will not do much harm to Home Rule, but it will do a great deal of injury to the Church itself. There are thousands of Home Rulers within its own fold, who will be disgusted, while the dissenting bodies will take care to turn this departure of the Church to her disadvantage.”

This was said in connection with the proposed disestablishment in Wales, and what we meant by “ going to destruction,” is going to disestablishment. The meaning of it is that we believed the Church would injure herself by praying to God to interfere in politics, for let it be remembered that we believed then the cablegram meant that. We do not think anyone ought to have taken that as an attack on the Church. Where is the attack 1 All that is said is the Church will injure herself if she goes on like this. As regards our mistake in saying the majority of Welshmen were Wesleyans, if we had used the word “ Nonconformists ” instead of “ Wesleyans,” we should have been right, so we were not far wrong. We have reproduced the cablegram and our comment theron, so that our readers by having all side by side can form their own conclusions as to whether we have been guilty of attacking the Church or not.— Ed].