Lambeth Conference, 1908.

Waiapu Church Times, Volume I, Issue 5, 1 November 1907, Page 13

Lambeth Conference, 1908.

The recent issu« by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge of a most valuable series of papers on the subjects to be discussed at the Pan- Anglican Congress, and the publication in our columns last month, of the programme of the Lambeth < -onferenee, emphasize the import--ance of a clear understanding of the nature and, object of the two great Church gatherings which are to take place in London next summer. The aim of this article is to prepare the way for such an understanding by recounting in as simple 'a manner as possible a few elementary facts in regard to them — facts, no doubt, familiar by now to many of the readers of the- W.C.T., but still forgotten or unknown to a great n amber of Church people. It is necessary, in the first place, to. lay hold of the fact that the Lambeth Conference and the PanAnglican Congress are two entirely distinct things. They have no connection with one another at all, save that they are to take place in consecutive months in the same year, the Pan-Anglican Congress meeting from June 16 to 22, the Lambeth Conference deliberations occupying the whole of the following month. As a matter of fact they are constantly confused in people's minds. Such confusion is not without excuse, in that the Lambeth Conference has sometimes in the past been described as- the Pan-Anglican Conference. To avoid misunderstanding, it will be best for the present- to adhere rigidly to the two terms Lambeth Conference and Pan-Anelican Congress. The Lambeth Conference is no new institution. Such conferences have taken place, roughly speaking,

every ten years since 1867— viz., in the years 1867, 1878, 1888, 1897. It is a gathering of Bishops. All Bishops of the Anglican Communion, or, to put it in another way, all Bishops of Churches in communion with the See of Canterbury, are invited to attend. Its discussions are not open to the public, but the resolutions which are passed are embodied in an " encyclical letter " and addressed to " the faithful " through the world. On the other hand, there has never been a PanAnglican Congress before. Its meetings will be open to clergy and laity, to men and women. There will be present delegates from every diocese in the Anglican Communion, and any English Churchman or Churchwoman who is ready to pay for a ticket will have the right of admission to all meetings. The importance of the Lambeth Conference depends upon a somewhat different set of considerations. The number whose presence is to be expected is chiefly interesting as h testimony to the growth of the Anglican Communion. In the year 1&67 144 Bishops were invited and 76 attended ; in the year 1878 173 were invited and 100 attended ; in 1888 211 were invited and 145 attended ; in 1897 the number of those who attended had risen ,to 197, but there seems to be no record available of the number invited. The number of those who are entitled to receive an invitation to the Conference of 1908 is about 300 ; of these it is expected that at least 230 will attend. Thus there has been a steady and rapid growth of the Episcopate ; and it is worth noticing that the proportion of those who attend in relation to those who are invited is far larger in the latter gatherings than in the former. This change is no doubt due to a growing recognition of the value of the deliberations which have taken place, and to the entire disappearance of the suspicion with which some of the Churchmen regarded the initiation of these assemblies. But it is rather the status of its members, as responsible rulers of the Church, than their quantity that gives to this gathering of the Bishops its special character and significance. It would be impossible for the leaders of any institution, which was carrying out its work in conditions as different as those which characterise the various dioceses of the . Anglican . Communion, to meet together for counsel and encouragement without gain to the whole organisation. Some Bishops are engaged in laying the foundations of native churches amid . such teeming populations as those of India and China ; it is the task of others to provide the ministra-

tions of the Church for a few lonely Christians scattered over /?uch vast areas as those of the dioceses of Selkirk and Alaska. Yet, : in whatever conditions they have been called to work, the problems of sin and unbelief with which they are confronted are much the same ; and it is in the one faith in the one Lord,' through grace supplied by th* same Sacramental ordinances, that they are everywhere set to meet the universal needs of the human race. Men who have so much in common, amid such diverse conditions cannot meet together and discuss each other's methods and difficulties, hopes and fears without great, though it may be indefinable, profit to themselves and to the work in which they are all alike engaged. But there is more than this. The Bishops are not the officers of a mere human organisation, but the divinely-appointed rulers of a Divine society, " the temple of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." They are the successors of the apostles and ambassadors for Christ. And though the Lambeth Conference has always disclaimed all pretensions to be, in any formal sense, a synodical or conciliar assembly, and though the various national Churches which are united in it are not bound to an acceptance of its decisions, yet still we may rightly believe that something of Divine illumination will be forthcoming for its deliberations ; and we may rightly' attribute to its conclusions an authority something more than human.