ANGLICAN CHURCHES. 



13 



held sixty-two meetings, and had had twenty- 

 nine cathedrals under consideration. The re- 

 port recommended that application should be 

 made to Parliament for the establishment of 

 a Committee of Privy Council for cathedral 

 purposes, to consist of the Archbishops of Can- 

 terbury and York, the Bishop of London, the 

 Lord President, the Lord Chancellor, and two 

 other members of the Privy Council (being 

 members of the Church of England), and to 

 have power to approve cathedral statutes. In 

 a statement of the general principles which 

 they had adopted for their guidance, the com- 

 missioners indicated that they would propose 

 regulations for the conduct of cathedral serv- 

 ices, and suggested that the capitular bodies 

 might give instruction in theological subjects, 

 and offer their services as preachers; while 

 canons, where accommodation renders it pos- 

 sible, should reside within the cathedral pre- 

 cincts for eight months during the year, and 

 should not hold preferment inconsistent with 

 the performance of diocesan duties. All prop- 

 ositions recommended in the report are quali- 

 fied by the reserve that vested interests must 

 be respected. 



The Bishoprie of Newcastle was constituted 

 by an order of council issued in May, the dio- 

 cese to consist of the county or Northumber- 

 land and the towns of Newcastle and Berwick- 

 upon-Tweed ; the parish church of St. Nicholas, 

 at Newcastle - on - Tyne, to be the cathedral 

 church ; and the bishop to be subject to the 

 metropolitan jurisdiction of the Archbishop of 

 York. The Rev. Ernest Roland Wilberforce 

 was appointed bishop of the new diocese, and 

 was consecrated in Durham Cathedral July 

 22d, and enthroned on the following Thursday. 



A report in favor of the separation of the 

 Channel Islands from the see of Winchester, 

 and their constitution into a separate diocese, 

 has been made by a joint committee of the two 

 Houses of Convocation. The new bishop, it 

 is proposed, should have jurisdiction over the 

 English congregations in Europe which are 

 not under the direction of the Bishop of Gib- 

 raltar. 



MISSIONARY SOCIETIES. The reports of the 

 missionary societies of the Church of England 

 showed that they had enjoyed a year of finan- 

 cial prosperity at home, and of encouraging 

 success in the mission-fields abroad. The in- 

 come of the Church Missionary Society had 

 been 221,135, and had been exceeded in only 

 two years 1878 and 1880 in the history of 

 the society. The expenditures had fallen be- 

 low the income. More than 8,000 sterling 

 had been applied for specific purposes, among 

 which were included a college in Hang-chow, 

 China, the extension of the missions on the 

 Niger and among the Esquimaux, etc. The 

 society employed 260 missionaries, 226 native 

 clergy, and 2,900 native lay agents, and had 

 connected with its churches 36,000 communi- 

 cants, 160,000 native Christian adherents, and 

 1,527 schools, with 65,000 scholars. The mis- 



sion in Sierra Leone continued to develop self- 

 reliance, and make progress in self-support ; a 

 large re-enforcement of laborers was to be sent 

 to Uganda, on the north shore of the Victoria 

 Nyanza. Considerable numbers of Moslem 

 children were attending the schools in Pales- 

 tine ; a station in connection with the Persian 

 mission was soon to be opened in Bagdad; in 

 India the native churches were growing in 

 number and strength, and 120 of the clergy, 

 were native against 94 European missionaries; 

 better relations had been established with the 

 Bishop of Colombo, in Ceylon ; and an exten- 

 sion of the mission in China where the native 

 Christians had doubled in the last five years- 

 was proposed, in three of the provinces. 



The Society for the Propagation of the Gos- 

 pel had received, on all accounts, 134,978, of 

 which 36,643 were in special funds for par- 

 ticular objects. It employed 594 missionaries, 

 and 1,283 catechists and teachers, and had 300 

 students in colleges abroad. The field of the 

 work of this society includes British residents 

 in the colonies, and everywhere, of whom the 

 membership of its churches is chiefly composed, 

 and only a small proportion of its resources is 

 spent in work among the heathen. The bish- 

 ops of Madras reported to the society that the 

 number of baptized native Christians connected 

 with the Church of England had increased 

 during four years from 79,917 to 101,246, the 

 increase being 21,329, or 27 per cent. One 

 half of this increase belonged to the Church 

 Missionary Society and one half to the Propa- 

 gation Society. The mission at Rangoon, in 

 Burmah, had now fourteen ordained mission- 

 aries (including six native clergymen), 1,400 

 communicants, 3,500 native Christians, and 54 

 chapels. 



The receipts of the South American Mission- 

 ary Society were 11,639, and its expenditures 

 12,887. Its mission in Terra del Fuego was 

 under the charge of one clerical and eight lay 

 missionaries. The clerical missionary, the Rev. 

 Thomas Bridges, had compiled a grammar and 

 dictionary of the Yahgan language, and had 

 translated the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of 

 the Apostles, and was now engaged upon a 

 translation of the Gospel of John, into that 

 language. 



CHURCH AND STATE. Both Houses of the 

 Convocation of Canterbury met for the dis- 

 patch of business, February 14th. The Convo- 

 cation of the Province of York met at the same 

 time. An important report on " Church and 

 State," prepared by a joint, committee of the 

 two convocations, was considered in both 

 bodies, and was approved in the Convocation 

 of Canterbury, but was deferred in the Con- 

 vocation of York. Its substance is as follows : 



Your committee having been appointed to consider 

 the constitutional relations between the authorities 

 ecclesiastical and civil in this Church, and realm, and 

 the best methods whereby common action may be 

 taken by them in matters affecting the Church, have, 

 in conference with a similar committee of the Lower 

 House of the Convocation of Canterbury, agreed to 



