Sta,—The excellent letter on this subject by Mr. Herbert England
in your issue of July roth includes towards the end one sentence that sur- prises me; and which illustrates the sort of differences that separate Christians.
He writes: "If the figures given by 'Janus' are only approximate to actuality, there must be another 50 per cent, at least who are detached Christians, i.e., those who are baptised and Christian at heart, but fail to continue as active members of any particular community which marks them as sectarian." Why does he link " baptised " and "Christian at heart "? How can any form of ceremony make a Christian "at heart "? Yet such ceremonies many Christian churches teach as essential. There is nothing more shocking to my mind than the opening sentences in the baptismal services in the Anglican prayei book- In the church service we read: "All men are conceived and born in sin," and in the honk service: "the child, who being born in original sin, and in the wrath of God." What a direct conflict there is between these horrible phrases and the beautiful words of Jesus taken from the gospel of S. Mark which follow these phrases. Jesus loved little chiletren, unbaptised children for certain, and said: "of such is the kingdom of God."
We know how these dreadful phrases arose- Augustin insisted on the doctrine of original sin, Calvin followed him, and so in these days does
Karl Barth. But most Englishmen and Englishwomen (and recently I have had direct evidence of this) at heart agree with the ancient Briton Pelagius (Morgan, in his own tongue). He denied the doctrine of original sin, and the taint of Adam, and maintained that every man was given by God power to receive the gospel. He proclaimed the spiritual freedom of man. He was a monk who lived about the year A.D. 400.
As we doctors know there are (alas) some children conceived and born in sin. Their parents have suffered from venereal disease, and conveyed the poison IO their seed. Baptism, nor any other form of ceremony will not help them. Indeed the belief in such magical ceremonies deters some parents from securing safety for their infants by being cured of their own evils before their children are conceived. So long as Christian churches teach the essential necessity of such ceremonies there can be no true attachment to them of men of thought. Such men remain Christians at heart, but they cannot become churchmen.—Yours faithfully,
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