Waiapu Church Gazette. Monday, July 1st, 1918. THE CHURCH AND THE P.P.A.

Waiapu Church Gazette, Volume VIII, Issue 13, 1 July 1918, Page 100

Waiapu Church Gazette. Monday, July Ist, 1918. THE CHURCH AND THE P.P.A.

The Protestant Political Association has been very much m evidence lately and much has been asid about the aloofness of the Church of England with regard to it. Is the Church of England "Protestant", or not? If so why does she resolutely refuse to support the P.P. A.?

First of all what is a'"Protestant?" Etymologically the word "Protestant" means "bearing public witness," m this sense the whole Catholic Church bears witness to the truth and is "Protestant"; but the modern "Protestant" does not bear witness to positive truth, he chiefly and almost entirely turns his attention to the criticism of what he thinks are other people's errors and m practice is so violent m his denunciation of various Catholic truths that it is. impossible for. a Catholic to have any part or lot with him. Anyone may be a modern "Protestant" so long as he raves against Rome and certain Catholic truths and practices which the Church of England, the Eastern Church and the Roman Church hold m common. He may be a Mormon, a Plymouthist, a Christadelphian, a theosophist, or anything else; he may hold nearly any heresy under the sun but if he will attack Rome he is ad-= mitted to the honoured fellowship of Protestantism and, no questions are asked about his x positive beliefs. With . such f heterogeneous . Protestantism we can have no sympathy. The Anglican Church rejects many Roman Errors and is fully alive to the rank disloyalty of a great many Irish Roman 'Catholics and their priests, but she cannot- associate herself with a body of Protestants who stand for nothing but •"opposition;" Bishop Samuel Parker, in' a treatise' 1 on '"The Case of the ■ Church"- of England, >? as far back as James ll. V reign , says:—^

• ' For as for the general term of Protestancy, it is an indefinite thing; we have some Protestants that believe, -there is a God;- and some that believe: there is none; some believe that they have a Saviour, and a soul to save, and some that laugh at both; there are Hobbian Protestants, Muggletonian Protestants, Socinian Protestants, Quaker Protestants, rebel Protestants, Protestants of 41 and Protestants of 48. All or most of which are as different as popery itself from the true Protestancy of the Church of England. ' ' Although many representative Bishops and .theologians of' the 16th and 17th Centuries commonly used the term Protestant as descriptive of the Church of England's attitude towards the papacy and Roman error the Church herself m her convocations deliberately refused the title because -it seemed to ally her with what she- called " schismatics" of all' kinds rather than with ' the Catholic .Church. The word was put into the Coronation Oath by the State as .the only terni. which definitely excluded a Roman Catholic . from succession to. . the Throne ', and it is used there m that sense. If the time should come when non-Roman Catholics are refused by the State the same . privileges and rights as Roman Catholics have, it will be time to join a Protestant JPoli^ tical Association, but meanwhile Protestants and Anglicans suffer under no disabilities; if Roman Catholic children, have free railway passes to Roman schools we and the Protestants can obtain a similar concession; and scholarships are tenable at Maori Denominational Schools of every denomination equally; if Roman Cathor lies during the time of war tried to rouse sectarian hatred against nonRomans, when it is the supreme interest of the State to keep the country united, by importing and distributing broadcast literature charging Protestants and their ministers with obominab'le immorality such literature would be banned by thepublic censor just as the P.P.A.'s is banned now. This is not the time for stirring up strife and the Church of England cannot sympathise with the efforts of the. P.P. A. m this direction. The Church has every sympathy with Protestants who preach the practical religion of Christian love and righteousness; but absolutely refuses: to join with a rabid political association whose only aim is to slander the principles and religion of other people and to divide the community into two warring factions; We should like -to see Archbishop Mannix and: his whole tribe of Irish disloyalists interned or deported; the severest 'measures m this repeet would be justified. :We ; equally applaud, the putting out of the way of ',: mischief of ..the:- seditious Reverend Chappel. We think the

Roman Church; . should^ -Ashow,.^ her loyalty by "dealing drastically" with disloyal Irish priests, but we refus.e. to believe that the- relig'ion ; profei§§ed' by so many Englishmen, Scotsmen, French and Italian heroes is itself m? volved m disloyalty. The French priests and their • people,- Cardinal Mercier and his noble Belgians have set an example to the world. of bravery and loyalty which some 6 Protestants' would do well, to follow.