ANGLICAN CHURCHES. 



Churches of England and Scotland as involving 

 a violation of religious equality, depriving those 

 Churches of the right of self-government, imposing 

 on Parliament duties which it is incompetent to 

 discharge, and as being hurtful to the religious 

 and political interests of the nation. 



The English Church Union. The forty- 

 second annual meeting of the English Church 

 Union was held in London in June, Lord Halifax 

 presiding. In his address the president referred 

 to the extent to which progress in the Church 

 during the past sixty years had been due to the 

 rank and file rather than to the rulers of the 

 Church. This would continue, and the ex- 

 tremists of to-day would be found to be the 

 moderates of to-morrow. While the Church of 

 England had not and could not forbid reserva- 

 tion and incense, the bishops ought to be obeyed 

 if they made regulations as to the conditions 

 under which the sacraments should be reserved. 

 It was of no use to attempt church reform until 

 the condition of lay franchise was fixed at com- 

 munion at least twice a year. The speaker 

 claimed that the period of shock and disintegra- 

 tion was past and the period .of unification had 

 come. Everywhere a desire appeared to come to- 

 gether and understand one another better. The 

 anniversary sermon was preached by Dr. Sanday. 

 The annual report represented that the financial 

 position of the society had suffered by reason of 

 the various public appeals of other kinds. The 

 amount received in subscriptions had been 504 

 less in 1900 than in 1899. In 1893, when the mem- 

 bership was some thousands less than it was now, 

 the subscriptions amounted to 101 more than in 

 the year under review. The appeals for aid for 

 the Defense fund brought in 2,282 between Janu- 

 ary, 1900, and April, 1901, and a sum of 800 

 was still needed for this purpose. 



At a previous meeting of the union, held in 

 March, Lord Halifax, being prevented by illness 

 from attending, sent a letter, in which he drew 

 attention to the importance of the distinction 

 between the idea of the collective episcopate and, 

 a fortiori, of any member of the episcopate, as 

 an independent teacher above the Church, and the 

 idea of the episcopate as an integral part of the 

 body. The episcopate, he urged, could " only 

 lawfully impose on the Church her own belief, 

 or upon the individual the belief of the body of 

 which he is a member." All the addresses at this 

 meeting urged the necessity of diocesan synods to 

 form the intermediate link between the parish 

 synod and the convocation. 



The Church Association. At the autumnal 

 meeting of the Church Association, held in Bir- 

 mingham, Nov. 9, 1900, Mr. Andrew Lamb read 

 a paper on The Urgent Need of Fresh Legislation 

 to amend the Procedure of the Ecclesiastical 

 Courts in the Matter of Ritual, in which he held 

 that the present enactments were not efficacious. 

 In the discussion which followed, suggestions 

 were made that recourse should be had to lay 

 tribunals under the act of Elizabeth, or to action 

 for breach of civil contract. At a public meet- 

 ing held in the evening it was resolved, " that, 

 whereas the bishops have done nothing to enforce 

 the laws of the Church of England as laid down 

 by her Majesty's judges, but have fostered rein- 

 troduction of the mass and of the confessional by 

 ordaining, licensing, inducting, and preferring 

 clergymen bent on promoting the reunion of 

 Christendom by adopting the usages of the most 

 corrupt portion of the unreformed churches, it 

 has now become the urgent duty of the electorate 

 to safeguard the nation from the great social 

 evils of priestly dominion." 



At the spring conference of the Church Associa- 

 tion and National Protestant League, held in 

 Liverpool, May 10, Mr. Andrew S. Lamb, pre- 

 siding, spoke in praise of the reformation settle- 

 ment, and dwelt upon the importance of retain- 

 ing the declaration against the mass. The Con- 

 vocations bill was criticised as contemplating 

 a formulated self-government, which would lead 

 to disestablishment. Resolutions were passed at 

 the public meeting condemning the " intrigues of 

 Romanizing clergy, which endangered the civil, 

 social, and religious liberties of the British na- 

 tion"; commending the efforts of the Church 

 Association to maintain the Protestant religion 

 established by law; and protesting against the 

 attempt of the Roman Catholics " to tamper 

 with" the statutory declaration made by the 

 Sovereign as being dangerous to the Protestant 

 succession to the throne; and requesting the 

 Protestant electors of the country to urge their 

 representatives in Parliament to oppose strenu- 

 ously any legislation which would interfere with 

 the bill of rights as being mischievous and un- 

 constitutional and fraught with great danger. 



The abandonment of the bill amending the 

 royal declaration was announced by Mr. Balfour 

 in the House of Commons on Aug. 8. 



At the annual meeting of the Ladies' League for 

 the Defense of the Reformed Faith in the Church 

 of England, Lord Llangattock presiding, a report 

 was made that the membership had doubled, the 

 present number of members being 4,443, in 29 

 branches. A sisters' home had been opened in 

 Chelsea, and a large number of ladies had come to 

 it. The words " and promotion " were ordered in- 

 serted after " defense " in the name of the society, 

 so that its name will hereafter read " The Ladies' 

 League for the Defense and Promotion of the Re- 

 formed Faith in the Church of England." The 

 meeting pledged itself by resolution to support 

 pure scriptural religion and worship, and to culti- 

 vate an earnest spiritual life. 



Convocation of Canterbury. At the meeting 

 of the Convocation of Canterbury, Dec. 11, 1900, 

 the Dean of Lincoln, preaching in Latin, referred 

 to the terms of the writ which still summoned 

 Convocation to consider not only Church matters 

 proper, but the " welfare of the public good and 

 the defense of the kingdom." Convocation no 

 longer met to vote taxes, but to deal with the 

 larger interests with which the Church should 

 concern itself. It should be as a guide to the 

 nation, inculcating patriotism and giving it a 

 high ideal. On the subject of recent controversies 

 in the Church of England, the speaker pleaded for 

 a good feeling and temper on all sides, and for 

 some constitutional means by which the Church 

 as a whole might consult together and express 

 its wishes. The great difficulty at the present mo- 

 ment was that the Church had got out of touch 

 with the laity. Proper representation in the 

 Church assembly of both clergy and laity was 

 necessary to enable Parliament to know what the 

 Church as a whole really wished, and also to 

 restore harmony within the Church itself. Arch- 

 deacon Lightfoot was reelected prolocutor of the 

 lower house. 



The Convocation met for the first time in 1901, 

 Feb. 15. The archbishop spoke in the upper house 

 of his reception during the week at Lambeth, of 

 a deputation on the bill for the reform of Convo- 

 cation and the constitution of houses of laymen 

 in connection therewith, and suggested, in view of 

 what had taken place then, that the consideration 

 of the bill in that house might be postponed. 

 Perhaps, in the meantime, it might be possible to 

 ascertain the views of the Government on the 



