A LAMBETH “VISION.”

Thames Star, Volume LVII, Issue 14729, 6 August 1921, Page 8

A LAMBETH “VISION.”

ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

The yisit of. the Archbishop of Canterbury, the. Bishop of Peterborough', arid :■ Bisho.p Robberds, -•'the Pfimus of. the- Scottish Episcopal Church, to the General Assembly of the Church of; ■ Scotland .in Edinburgh, on May 31; created'great interest," arid’ the'addf esses which i they gave in- support, of the Lambeth appeal for unity in , the Christian Church “were;; libteiied ; to with the 1 closest - attention.-*-*- »

The Assembly adopted a resolution instructirig a committee to take into consideration the Lambeth Conference appea,l - and report to the next General Assembly. Dr. Wallace Williamsorf, who moved the resolution, said he shared the great vision which the Arfehbishop had predicted, and invited his Grace‘to * preach in the -pulpit of- Old St. Giles’ Cathedral, so that they might sweep away- certain traditions of the past that made the place uncomfortable, and’ led to many, riaisunderstaridings.

In his. address at. the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, the Archbishop of Canterbury began by-referring to the Lambeth' Conference, which assembled in 1920; as being unique in its importance. Out of 368 men holding episcopal office in the Church, 252 were present, from every part of..the world.. ...... A NEW OUTLOOK. The Archbishop then con-' tinued: “We tried, as never before, to get a new outlook as to the Church’s impact on the world, and to re-set, if that be needed) both the effort and trie plan. We cast our eyes deliberately backward and outward .i and oil ward. Backward. Back to apostolic days. To the Galilean, hillside. Jhe more closely we look into that picture trie more visibly do we find not the mere allegiance of a number of converts to the new faith, but a definite- community, a church or society founded to be the depository of Christ’s Gospel. And I imagine that you and I keep asking ourselves - as we peer back into those days: What had those men got which-we have"lost or missed' or marred?

. “Some of you know, as I do, how hard it is for an old man to re-cast the thoughts which he has treated as axioms for a score of years, to reconstruct the familiar architecture of his spiritual home. But we did try. It came home to us that we must, simply must, appeal to all Christian people that we should consider our ways, and see whether a larger and a newly-devised unity might not first be a possibility, then a duty, then an element of power. AN APPEAL. ' And we 1 found utterance in the .appeal to all Christian people, which is in your hands. It has had a reception to which my long experience offers no parallel. It is sold by tclns of thousands. You can read it in Latin, in Greek, in Spanish, in Portuguese, in Russian, v and French, and Italian, and German, and . even Esperanto, and its chord is vibrant. “How oddly the utterance has been, I will not say misrepresented here and there, blit utterly misunderstood. It has been described as a programme —almost as an agenda . paper —or even, mirabile dictu, as an ultimatum, instead of being a reverent attempt to give to our vision some coherent form, if only a cloud-shape. We had, and have, in view, not solely, I think I might say not . even chiefly,' our home differences and schismats, but Christendom as a whole. That means, as one great section, the Church of the Historic East, with its tap-roots deep down in the earliest centuries—its life dim and unfamiliar to most,of us, either in its history or in its expansions and curtailments, or in its present trend, yet capable, as we are beginning eagerly to see, of new sympathies which may surprise .us all —witness what happened in Geneva a few months ago.

NO -‘‘SUBMISSION.”

“And, more difficult far, the historic West. We have never ceased to make it clear that we can enter no portal of fellowship which has

submission graven o*l its lintel —submission to what would be unendurable because it is untrue. And no path which we could possibly tread upon a reconciliation road is at present even dimly in sight. Yet I dare not myself quite say Lasciate cogni speranza, or hold it inconceivable that in the Providence of God a truer light may some day dawn. So our vision cannot rightly, with regard to either East or West, take a constructive shape which would for ever render such approach, even in the long last unthinkable. If, to any here, even these guarded words seem dangerous, let me remind you, for it is constantly overlooked or ignored, that in our published appeal we say quite definitely that before any overt step towards new intercommunion or new ministerial comity can take place with any group or section of our fellow-Christians, terms of union must be otherwise satisfactorily adabsolute safeguard, surely, against rash ministerial action or ' any sort. CRITICISM WANTED. “Will anyone deny that for future times, at least, forgetting for a moment the interim days, our project must give due place, even its earliest .ground '.plan, to usages, if we call them no more, which held their own unbrokerily from the second century to the 16th, and in the greater part of Christendom held their own still? -Without some form —and- there are many possible, forms —of an Episcopate, can we frame even in vaguest outline a working plan which would meet our need? I think not; but ■perhaps in saying that I am mistaken. We want criticism- —not hurried or abrupt, but deliberate. Orily, I venture to . claim that the critic, as he helps Us in the coming days to think things out and to give them shape, shall tell us what his own alternative sketch for a scheme of real unity would be. If, for practi • cal purposes, we w r ore thinking only of the Church of Scotland and of the Church of England, the problem, though an anxious one and one requiring time, would be comparatively —only comparatively —simple. But what of the growing multitude of modern Christian sects-and denominations, great and small? UNIFICATION NEEDED. “In the Lambeth Conference the 51 representatives of the United States were, for the most part, quite as keen in issuing our appeal as were the English or the Australian or . the Indian bishops. Those too, have the, task before them. Now, in the last issued ■ census return of the United States,' two large volumes entitled religious 1 bodies are wholly devoted to detailed tabulation and description -of- s'ejparate denominations. Am I wrorig in saying that the study of those massive volumes of divisions and Subdivisions is calculated to make any thoughtful Christian mrin shudder and quail? Something steadying, something unifying, is surely needed there, if fellowship is to come. Mere kindly spirit and goodwill can never mee# the need. You have our Lambeth .vision and a general outline of a plan framedvthereon. I ask my critic: What is yours?” . The Archbishop here quoted an appeal for = the unity of the Church made many years ago in that Assembly by Dr. Milligan,' the Moderator. DANGER OF IdASTE. “Now, if Dr. Milligan’s appeal, or our Episcopal appeal, be true,” con-> tinued the Archbishop, “we who want to bring about that larger unity must take heed to our steps upon what lines, if any, we move forward. There may well be different ways of doing it. But the experimental hypothesis, the initial scheme, is none the less the origin of what ultimately takes practical shape, ' and without some such tentative beginning the result, immensely improved, perhaps, differ t ing widely, from the first conception, woqld never have been attained. I am not careful to press in detail the merits or the difficulties of what is at best but. thfj tentative outline of a plan. I prefer to leave you with our vision, with all the earnestness that I can, to call upon you, if you will, to co-operate with us in a sacred endeavour. We bespeak the aid of the National Church of Scotland as a force of extraordinary value .towards the attainment, some day, of' what we dimly see. On this point or" that, when you come to give attention to. detail, you may not like our way of handling the question. Show us, then,.a more excellent,way. Only, if it is to meet the case, . it must be consistent, remember, with out root principles—first, a unity of life and action, not a federation of disjointed and mutually exclusive groups; and, next, a practically world-wide, range for our corporate activity. The thing, we realise it to the full, is not going, to come about quickly. There are no short cuts. I go so far as to say that it is in the rash enthusiasm of short cuts that our chief .peril lies.”.