RITUALISM CONDEMNED.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXXIII, Issue 12621, 18 November 1908, Page 7

RITUALISM CONDEMNED.

trees Association— Telegraph — Copyright. ~ Beceived November 18, 9.7 a.m. SYDNEY, November 18. At the annual meeting of the Church of England Association, the report declared that every effort had been made to uphold the principles of reformation, and to counteract the pernicious ritualistic teaching. The bishops were blamed for the introduction of false doctrines and ritualistic practices, which have taken such a firm foothold. The Church Episcopal Bench in England has been filled with Romanising Bishops, who permitted the introduction of medieval superstitious, and sacramental idolatries. The aim of the Society was to resist the spread of the system of sacerdotal despotism, which threatened to undermine the fundamental doctrines of Christianity and restore the mass confessional and the blasphemous doctrine of transubstantion. It was sad to record the startling fact that 3000 clergy were wearing illegal vestments, and in dim religious light and gaudy and ostentatious colours and vestments allured men to ritualism. The position was intolerable, and called for drastic action.

The President attacked Bishop Stepney, who was intending to visit Australia,, for his extreme ritualism. His appointment to the Archbishopric of York, no doubt, would cause consternation in England as it did here. It was hard that York should have such a ritualist forced on it.