MODERNISM IN PROTESTANT PRUSSIA.

Wanganui Chronicle, Issue 12856, 11 April 1912, Page 4

MODERNISM IN PROTESTANT PRUSSIA.

"Wo are not surprised at the treatment of Loisy and Tyrrell by the Roman Church, but we almost have to rub our • eyes when we read of similar treatment to a man of fine character and unimpeachable record in Protestant Germany." So writes the Rev William Blackshaw in the course of an article in a recent issue of the " Contemporary" describing the measures taken by the Protestant State Church of Prussia to cheek tho growth of Modernism among its clergy. The Prussian Tyrrell to whom reference is made in tho above quotation is a pastor jiam?>d Jatho, who at the beginning of last year was dismissed from his, cure p.t Cologne for heresy. JJo had had a distinguished career in the church, and on the occasion of the centenary celebrations of tho evangelical community of Cologne in 1902 he received from the King of Prussia the, Order of the Red p]agle. Even his en^thies admit that his ministerial activities had been crowned with great success, and that bo had won large numbers of people back to membership of the church. His teachings seem to have resembled closely t'.iosa known in England as the "New Theology." He held., for example, that the idea of a God who stands outside the work! is to be rojected, that G:>d is really immanent in the world, and that, as His activity Ls eternal creation, a definite act of creation in time is unthinkable. Religion he regarded as a cultivation of conscious relations between the ideal "living Christ" and the historical Jesus. Jatbo's condemnation provoked many protests, but the authorities of the Prussian Church are evidently resolved to enforce orthodoxy. A mass meeting of Berlin- theological liberals was announced for March 27 last to express sympathy with him. A prominent minister from Cologne (Pastor Radackc?) was advertised to speak, and three Berlin ministers were invited to take part in the proceedings. Two days before the meeting these gentlemen received notice fron the chief ecclesiastical authority for Berlin that active participation in the meeting would be regarded as a misdemeanour, for which there would be penalties. The ministers, however, disregarded the warning and took part in the meeting. The result was that they were suspended fr-umgEthe exercise of. their ecclesiastical functions for six weeks. Three months later, in the leading church of tbi> Berlin suburb of Charlottenburg, the officiating minister, a man of known liberal tendencies, devoted the major part of his sermon to a consideration of the Jatho case. The church is used as a garrison church, and on tho Sunday in question a battalion of .soldiers was attending divine service. Tho preacher expressed the opinion that the judgment against Jatho would be a serious blow to the freedom of teaching in tho church, and prophesied that people would lose confidence in their

ministers if it was thought that they used the pulpit to preach only what they were forced to preach by fear of removal from office.. "What," he asked, "ought ministers to preach and , teach? The Word of God. But what i ■is the Word of God? " Here there were obvious signs of unrest among tho officers, but the preacher continued his sermon. He then went on to point out that in the Bible were to be found not only fundamental ideas of religion, but also purely human thoughts, and the difficulty was to decide upon the boundary between these two. At. this stage the unrest among the officers became acute, and at last the officer in command ordered the whole battalion to march out of the church. Tho minister entered a protest against the action of the officer in disturbing divine service, but the Ecclesiastical Court, which heard the protest, upheld tho action of the officer and condemned the sermon of the minister. Quite a heated controversy has been raging over the action of the Prussian ecclesiastical authorities, and petitions bearing over forty thousand [signatures, among which are included those of several well-known professors and theologians, have been presented on behalf of Jatho. It ?s worthy of note that Professor Ha mack, while regretting tho judgment against Jatho, declined to sign a petition of protest, on the ground that the Prussian Church was not simply a Christian church, but a national church, and had therefore to uphold a definite legal position.