The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, MARCH 10, 1910. A CHURCH IN CHAINS

New Zealand Tablet, 10 March 1910, Page 381

The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, MARCH 10, 1910. A CHURCH IN CHAINS

RE&SURE of more urgent'topics has compelled $ llSSj' llS i to j ay tIU now our reference to the critiA\ I r~fy • f nd momento «s Situation which has arisen ff the Anglican Church in England by reason us to delay till now our reference to the critical and momentous situation which has arisen m the Anglican Church in England by reason ot the decision recently pronounced by the ' Court of Appeal in the now historical case of Banister v. Thompson. The effect of the T decision is to lay down absolutely the principle that the Church of England is .the mere creature of Parliament and that the State is' the sole and supreme authority, not only as to what that Church shall be allowed to teach, but . also for. determining and altering at will the conditions under which members are to be admitted to its Sacraments. * The history of the case covers a somewhat lengthy period, but we will compress the facts into the briefest possible space. Ever since her foundation, in the reign of Henry VIII., the Church of England has held that marriage with a deceased wife’s sister was ‘ contrary to the law of God,’ and has forbidden such unions as abominable and incestuous.’ From the time of the English Reformation up till the year 1906 English statute law also condemned and forbade such marriages. On August 28, 1907 however, the King gave his assent to the Deceased Wife’s Sister’s Marriage Act, which not only made these marriages legal for the future, but which also validated all existing unions of that nature. Relying on the provisions of this Act, a certain Mr. Banister, who had married his deceased wife’s sister, presented himself, in company with his wife, at the parish church at Eaton, in the diocese of Norwich, for the reception of Holy Communion, but the vicar, Canon H. Thompson, refused to allow the couple to receive the Sacrament. The canon held that as Mr. Banister had married his deceased wife’s sister, his marriage was ‘contrary to the law of God,’ and the couple being therefore in the eyes of the Church ‘open' and notorious evil livers he was justified in denying them the Sacraments. Mr. Banister took his grievance to the Court of the Arches, the ecclesiastical court of the province of Canterbury, and won his case ; and Canon Thompson was ‘ admonished.’ He then applied to the Court of the . King’s Bench for an order restraining the Dean of the Arches from proceeding farther in the matter, and again the Canon lost his case. Not to be daunted, he turned to the Court of Appeal, Three judges heard the case; and in the decision recently given they rejected * the appeal unanimously, condemning Canon Thompson to pay the costs. * Each of the three judges gave a carefully prepared judgment, and each was emphatic in his view that under the conditions existing in the case in question ministers ofthe Church of England were absolutely bound to administer the Communion. The Master of the Rolls, the presiding

judge, was unblushingly candid in his statement of the change in .the moral aspect of such unions—and, by consequence, in the teaching and practice of the Church of England— by the new Act. By statutes passed in the reign of Henry VIII., his Lordship pointed out, ‘ marriages of a certain class, including expressly a marriage of a- man with his deceased wife’s sister, were made illegal and void. It was not merely illicit cohabitation; it was incest; it was absolutely void ah initio. . . In 1907 Parliament amended the law relating to marriage with a deceased wife’s sister. What was the result? Surely to make that lawful matrimony which before was illicit cohabitation and incest, with .all its consequences.’ To please Henry VIII. Parliament declared all marriages with a deceased wife’s sister to be contrary to the law of God,’ ‘ abominable and incestuous,’ and for nearly three hundred and seventy years the Church of England has dutifully denounced them as such. ■ But Parliament has changed its mind; and now at a moment’s notice the Church of England is called upon to take back all her denunciations and to bless what she has so long condemned. Yesterday marriage with a deceased wife’s sister was ‘ null and void ah initio and . ‘against God’s law ’; to-day an ordained representative of the Church which so condemned it is not only permitted to solemnise such a marriage, but he is to be compelled, at the bidding of the secular authority, to seal such unions with the Communion. It is a bitter pill, but it will be swallowednay, it has been swallowed, almost without a gulp. Bishop Gore, it is true, has described the decision as ‘ plainly intolerable,’ and the Church Times has said valiantly that it ‘ must be resisted ; but the Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of All England, with what his admirers call ‘statesmanlike moderation,’ has already counselled obedience. ‘Another question,’ he says, ‘ will speedily arise; indeed, it has already shown itself above the horizon. How ought the clergy, in the exercise of their ministerial responsibility, to regard those who have legally contracted these marriages since the passing of the Act? Many who so marry will claim the ordinary privileges and ministrations of the Church. Are these to be withheld ? I have no hesitation in saying that from men and women who are otherwise entitled to receive these privileges they ought .not, in my judgment, to be withheld on the mere ground of such a marriage. . .’ ‘ The mere ground of such a marriage ’—and yesterday, according to the Master of the Rolls, it was ‘not only illicit cohabitation, but incest ’! * The significance of the thrice-repeated decision in this important case lies in the circumstance that it brings out with an emphasis, from which there is no escape, the fact that in the Church of England, so long as it continues to be the Established State Church, it is the Crown and not the Church that rules in things spiritual, and that, so long as these legal fetters remain, the English Church, instead of being a messenger of God, is, as Newman expressed it, ‘ nothing more nor less than an Establishment, a department of Government, a function or operation of the State, — without a substance, —a mere collection of officials, depending on and living in the supreme civil power.’ One of the first effects of the decision will be to give a marked fillip to the movement in the direction of disestablishment and disendowment of the English Church. Already that movement has acquired very considerable momentum. Last year Mr. Asquith brought in the Welsh Disestablishment Bill, which contained proposals by the operation of which the Church of England in Wales would be both disestablished and disendowed on January 1, 1911. The measure was withdrawn on August 20, but the Premier gave a distinct promise that the Bill should be passed in 1910. The wider movement for the complete disestablishment of the Episcopal Church throughout England is also making headway, and the principle has, by a large majority, been formally approved by the House of Commons. On February 27, 1907, by 200 votes to 92 (majority, 108), the House of Commons passed the following emphatic resolution : That in the interests alike of religion and the nation it is desirable to Disestablish and Disendow the Church of England both in England and Wales.’ As a result of the decision in Banister v. Thompson, the High Church section of the Anglican body, who keenly feel and strongly resent their present position of bondage • to the

secular power, are likely either to openly advocate disestablishment, or at least to cease to , offer opposition to it. Ihe Church Times, the recognised organ of the High Church party, says frankly that ‘if they [i.e. } the Bishops] do not repudiate the legal view that the State is the supreme, the sole, authority to determine what the Church is to teach, and to alter at will the conditions under which the latter admits to its altars, we can only say that they will have brought within very reasonable distance the catastrophe which they so greatly dread. For our part, we would not preserve for five minutes the life of a Church that was-no Church in any Christian sense, but a mere department of the Civil Service.’ If the other advocates of Disestablishment are reinforced by a party working for ‘ Disestablishment from within,’ the whole question will be very quickly brought within the range of practical politics, and the separation of Church and State in England as well as in Wales will be a matter of the proximately near future. * Another probable effect of this remarkable decision will be the transfer, sooner or later, of a number— may be great or it may be small— the more earnest members of the Anglo-Catholic party in the Church of England to the fold of the one true Catholic Church. We have arrived at a point,’ says the annual letter of the Secretary of the English Church Union, ‘ when it has been decided, in the case of Canon Thompson, that the Church has no law of her own, and that it is practically the function of the State, acting through Parliament, to legislate for the Church in the domain of Christian morality.’ Such a state of things .cannot possibly be tolerated by men who have any sort of notion of the Church as a divinely-established teaching body or who have any real hold on the ‘ Catholic ’ principles which they profess. The Gorham decision of 1850— which the courts laid down that ministers of the Church of England were under no obligation to teach the doctrine of Baptismal Regenerationled to the conversion of Allies, and ultimately of Manning— to mention a host of lesser lights who sooner or later came over. A similar effect is almost certain to follow from the present exercise of State authority. Poor Canon Thompson writes as follows to the Church Times: ‘ Again I ask leave to acknowledge in your widely-circulated pages the many letters of sympathy lam receiving. We now understand the Act of 1907. The State gives law to the Church.’ grant that he and others like him may act according to their understanding.’ N . )