696 EEFOKMED CHURCHES. 



REFORMED EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 



candidate for the holy ministry before his con- 

 secration." The obligation of this agreement 

 was held subject to the ratification of the 

 bodies which the two commissions represented. 

 Pending the convocation of electors to choose 

 a new synod, it was agreed that the appeal of 

 the Liberals to the Council of State should be 

 held in abeyance ; that the matter of the ap- 

 peal, as well as the agreement of accord, should 

 be held subject to the ratification of a new 

 assembly of Liberals to be called at Ninies; 

 and that all concessions so far made on both 

 sides should be considered as made solely 

 with a view to pacification. This agreement 

 met with no favor from the Orthodox party. 

 One of the members of the permanent com- 

 mission refused to sign it, and published a letter 

 against it. Several consistories, presbyterial 

 councils, and pastoral conferences, adopted res- 

 olutions protesting against it, as in effect sur- 

 rendering all that was essential in the Confes- 

 sion of Faith, and in the safeguards which the 

 synod had erected to secure its integrity. A 

 meeting of delegates of the Liberal party, to 

 consider the agreement, was held at Nimes, 

 July 12th and 13th. It adopted an elaborate 

 and skillfully-drawn paper, defining the con- 

 struction which would be put upon the terms 

 of the agreement of accord by the Liberal 

 party. The members of the permanent com- 

 mission replied to this paper, July 25th, that 

 they did not interpret the agreement in the 

 sense put upon it by the Liberal conl'erence, 

 but repelled it, and charged that the construc- 

 tion given the agreement by the conference 

 essentially changed its nature. 



Another conference was held at Rouen, 

 November 8th, to attempt to adjust the dif- 

 ferences of opinion within the Church and pre- 

 vent schism. It was attended by persons of 

 both parties, but the Orthodox members con- 

 ducted the proceedings. It adopted a paper 

 protesting against schism, and calling upon the 

 friends of peace to work for the union of the 

 Church on the common ground of attachment 

 to its faith and its historical institutions and 

 traditions ; expressing the belief that the synod 

 alone can prevent disintegration, and asking 

 its immediate convocation ; calling upon the 

 consistories and presbyterial councils to accept 

 the religious conditions of the electorate ; 

 declaring attachment to the synodal organiza- 

 tion and the self-government of the Church ; 

 calling upon the synod to authorize the for- 

 mula of consecration already in use, or one simi- 

 lar to it; agreeing to ask the withdrawal of 

 the demand for confirmation by the state of 

 the rule requiring candidates for consecration 

 to the ministry to declare their adherence to 

 the Declaration of Faith ; and affirming that 

 the ecclesiastical judicatories already possessed 

 the power to restrain all attacks against the 

 general faith of the Church. 



On the 9th of December, M. Dufaure, Min- 

 ister of Justice and "Worship, ordered the elec- 

 tions to be held in all the consistories and 



presbyterial councils during the second half of 

 February, 1877, and directed that the parish 

 registers be closed previous to the elections on 

 the 31st of January. These elections, it was 

 further ordered, should be held in accordance 

 with the religious conditions of the electorate 

 as the General Synod had determined them, 

 while the responsibility for regulating the 

 mode of applying the conditions was left to 

 the several bodies. This decree was confirmed 

 December 18th, by M. Martel, successor to M. 

 Dufaure in the office of Minister of Justice 

 and Worship. 



IV. REFORMED CHURCH OF HOLLAND. The 

 synod of this Church in 1875, at the request of 

 about four hundred pastors, who deemed the 

 form of the Declaration of Faith required of 

 candidates for confirmation to be too dog- 

 matic, changed it so as to give it a more lib- 

 eral sense. The synod of 1876 revoked this 

 action, and again made the old form obligatory. 

 A meeting of the Liberal party was held at 

 Amsterdam in October, at which it was deter- 

 mined to petition the synod to reconsider its 

 later action, and restore the form of confession 

 adopted in 1876. The Orthodox party in the 

 synod is represented to be seeking a separation 

 from the Liberal party. 



V. CHRISTIAN REFORMED CHURCH OF THE 

 NETHERLANDS. The Christian Reformed 

 Church of the Netherlands was separated from 

 the Reformed Church in 1834, partly for doc- 

 trinal reasons and partly with the object of 

 giving expression to their desire that the Church 

 should be free from state control. It consists 

 of about 350 congregations, and has upward of 

 300 ordained ministers, about 40,000 commu- 

 nicants, and about 120,000 adherents. The 

 members of the Church are stated to be, as a 

 rule, of the middle and humbler classes. In 

 May, 1875, 70 students were being educated 

 for the ministry, under the care of five pro- 

 fessors. A sixth professor was appointed by 

 the synod which met that year at Bois-le-Duc, 

 and an effort was projected to raise the sum of 

 7,000, to render the theological school at 

 Kampen more efficient. 



REFORMED EPISCOPAL CHURCH. At 

 the meeting of the General Council of the Re- 

 formed Episcopal Church, held at Ottawa, Ont., 

 in July, reports were presented from thirty-four 

 congregations, giving their statistics as follows: 

 Number of families, 2,311 ; of communicants, 

 3,549; of children in the Sunday-schools, 4,905; 

 of teachers in the same, 400; amount of con- 

 tributions by the congregations, $151,131.41. 



The General Council of the Reformed Epis- 

 copal Church met at Ottawa, Ont, July 12th. 

 Bishop Charles Edward Cheney was chosen 

 presiding bishop, in place of Bishop Cummins, 

 deceased. The committee appointed at a pre- 

 vious meeting of the General Council to report 

 on the points of difference between the Re- 

 formed Episcopal Church and the Protestant 

 Episcopal Church in the United States made 

 the following report : 



