THE CHRISTIAN SOCIAL UNION.
[TO THE EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR."]
Sra,—With reference to Canon Gore's complaint in your last issue of the reluctance of laymen to join the Christian Social Union, I venture to ask, with all diffidence, whether such reluctance may not be due, at least in part, to the exclusive character of this Society? With a title so grand that it might describe, on one side at least, the Universal Church itself, it is limited, I believe, to members of the Church of England or other Anglican Communions. There was no such limitation of membership attached to the Society of Christian Socialists in the middle of the century, and associated with the names of Maurice and of Kingsley, of which Mr. Ludlow still survives. In the case of the Charity Organisation Society, established thirty years ago, its rule has ever been to enlist not only Christians, but those also who stand outside all Christian Communions, in the endeavour to apply Christian principles to the relations between rich and poor. If its sphere is more limited, on the theoretical side, than that of the Christian Social Union, it has found no lack of practical workers, both male and female, lay and clerical. Again, one may point to the Co-operative movement and to the Labour Asso- ciation in connection with it, which endeavour to realise truer Christian ideals in the respective spheres of distribution and of production. These recognise no distinctions of religious profession in their members. Yet neither the Charity Organisation Society, nor any of these voluntary associations, would ever have existed apart from Christianity, as neither would constitutional government itself, or the Poor-law, or our public and legal institutions generally. Whatever justification may be held for the application of a religious test to the members of the Christian Social Union, it would seem to be inconsistent with the title of the Society, except on the assumption that none but Anglicans are Christians. Unless it is prepared to assert this position, the Union should surely either repeal its exclusive rule, or should change its title to that of the Anglican Christian Social
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